


I'm Sorry, Sweetie; Did I Just Steal Your Heart?

by eliwaflynn



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Cop/thief, M/M, Multi, POV Alternating, POV First Person, crowstiel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-01-19 18:49:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 30,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1480225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eliwaflynn/pseuds/eliwaflynn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Meet Crowley: The Thief of Hell. Meet Castiel: Just a regular cop. What happens when the two of them meet and the black-and-white of good-and-bad goes into a blur?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hello, Aren't You Just Scrumptious?

**Author's Note:**

> This is a story WIP that I started on FF.net over a year ago and want to publish it on here as well as there.
> 
> \- 
> 
> So a friend and I always joke about Crowstiel. It's our crack-pairing because she cosplays as Crowley and I cosplay as Cas, and, of course, because Crowley flirts with Cas every step of the way. This is a cop!Cas and thief!Crowley AU; an attempt at comedy, but let's see what happens.
> 
> DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN SUPERNATURAL OR ANY OF ITS CHARACTERS. 
> 
> +Please note: *** signifies a time skip; xxx signifies a POV change.
> 
> Favorite/Comment/Share if you like it! Enjoy!~

It’s never fun to be the good guy. You always have numerous, petty rules—laws _and_ morals. It just gets very irking and exhausting. My motto is “do the hell you want to do,” but a lot of people don’t appreciate it. Ah well. To each their own, right?

Anyway, hi, nice to meet you—Th’name’s Crowley. I’m a thief and a liar, as they all like to say. I just like to consider myself strong-willed, and I just happen to know what I want. I “steal,” as you all like to say, but, really, come on; I’m just taking what I need. Everyone needs money in this economy, right?

Well, one day I was planning on stealing this priceless necklace at the jewelry store in the mall across town—but that wasn’t the only thing I stole that day. The other thing was, well, a bit _unexpected_ … Allow me to explain.

*******

I was sneaking over to Carla’s Jewelry in the mall—oh, hush, now! Of course I broke into the mall easily. They don’t pay attention to the little details that allow us, the geniuses, into these money-breathing palaces. I made it over to the fountain across the store and smiled as I stared into the empty thing. I took out a penny and flicked it in, more mocking your average _Homo_ _sapien_ , and made a wish to humor myself: _I wish I could steal the most important thing in the world._ I know I could if I would ever find it—cocky? Yeah, I am. You can go to the Complaint Center in the corner of Kiss My Ass if you want, sweetie.

Anyhoo, I waltzed over to the store and scoped the area for the security cameras. I was sure I covered every single one, but it’s never a waste to check over, is it? Once I was sure I had everything covered, I shook at the doors. They were locked, but very loose. I smiled with pride as I took out my single, trusty lock pic and unlocked the doors in a matter of five seconds. Scoffing at how easy it was, I walked inside to find everything in such an organized lock-down.

People think they are very smart with how they hide things and lock up the valuables. Here, the most expensive ones weren’t in their cases anymore. They were locked away in the safe that would be located in the most obvious spot ever. I found it easily in the backroom of the store, behind the “Employees Only” door. Finding a way to open it is child’s play—I got it opened and saw the money piled in the cash register trays and the most valuable items neatly “hidden” behind them.

No, most thieves don’t stuff everything in a bag and hope that no one notices that “Hm, that guy looks a bit suspicious with that huge bag that’s making weird noises while he runs”—no, we are not stupid, mind you. I have hidden pockets in my tux jacket, and don’t take more than I can carry.

So, once I was leisurely on my way out of the mall, I noticed there was a policeman close by. “Oh, my word… Really?” I sighed to myself while I walked casually to him. The police officer didn’t see where I came from, as it was dark out and I am _smart_ —but anyway. I looked over at him, and, I must say! He was a sight for sore eyes, to say the least. He looked a bit nervous in his nice-fitting  (what?) uniform—probably only started this particular job recently. There was only a faint light from an above lamppost, and the officer was pointing his flashlight right at me to get a better look. I could see his bright, blue eyes from a mile away, even if it were in the dark. They were very noticeable, in my opinion. He didn’t have a hat on, so I got to see very messy hair going in every which direction possible. There was also stubble spread equally across his face. I must say: that small clef chin was a bit _adorable._

“Hello, officer. Anything wrong?” I smiled politely.

“What are you doing here?” a raspy and deep voice greeted me, making me jump from surprise. What an elegant voice. I didn’t reply; only cocked my head to the side and observed him more, making him a bit uneasy.

“I asked you a question that you are forced to answer, since I am a policeman,” he nervously barked at me. I noticed his hand holding the flashlight was shaking slightly.

“I’m sorry, Officer—?”

“Castiel.”

“I’ve been searching for a watch that my boyfriend lost around here earlier today. He didn’t realize he lost it until a lot later, the poor chap,” I smiled, attempting to make it an awkward one.

“Did you find it?” the man’s grip on his flashlight loosened. My response seemed to relax him.

“No, actually… I checked around everywhere out here but cannot seem to find that buggar. Maybe it’s hiding somewhere inside,” I let out a ponderous huff as I put my hand up to my chin for a few seconds.

Castiel (what, do I need to include a formal name for him when I am telling the story myself?) shifted his weight a few times, waiting for me to say something else. When I didn’t, he sighed and let out, “You’ll only be able to do that during opening hours, sir.” He then looked up at me.

I smiled pleasantly, “Oh, sweetie, just call me Crowley.”

He looked away, not expecting my informalities. “Mister Crowley, sir, please, let me accompany you to your car. I was told to monitor this place because a thief may be thinking of hitting this place tonight. I wouldn’t want an innocent man getting caught up in the middle of this,” he attempted to smile back, but he was just nervous as hell to where it turned out to be a strange opening of the mouth—but it also allowed me to view his perfectly white teeth. Hn. _This man is cute_ , I allowed myself to think while he put his hand on my shoulder to lead me away from the supposed dangerous zone. _Cute, yes, but very naïve. Poor boy; trying to protect me from myself, ha_. I also wondered why in the world he was the only man put on parole here. I shrugged it off, though, because it made my life easier; who am I to complain?

“Where is your car?” the deep voice resonated again. I enjoyed it a lot, for some reason.

“It is right there,” I pointed to the crimson red Lincoln.

Castiel kept his hand on my shoulder as we walked over to it. “I am sorry about your boyfriend’s watch. I’m sure you’ll find it tomorrow,” he tried smiling at me again, but he was still nervous. He stood there, making sure I would get in my car safely, which made me laugh to myself.

As I started to back up, I rolled down my window and waved at him before asking, “Are you new to this, Officer?”

I could tell that he straightened his posture even more (if that was even possible) and then chuckled slightly, “Is it really that obvious?” He then ran a hand through his hair.

“A little, but don’t worry, _sweetie_ —you’re doing a _great job_ ,” I gave him polite smile, and he thanked me nervously, and I could sense a small blush of embarrassment on his face from the little light coming from his flashlight. Once I closed my window and drove off into the main road, I couldn’t help smirking to myself. Hey, he did do a great job—for me, anyway. Oh, details, details. I also couldn’t stop thinking about how adorable he was, nervous and all. Now, now, just because I am a thief does not mean I cannot appreciate beauty—well, actually, I am a thief _because_ I can appreciate beauty.


	2. Can't Get Enough of Me, Can You?

A few days after my successful looting in Carla's Jewelry, I decided to go out and celebrate—and by celebrate, I mean go to a club specifically made for thieves. Yes, they exist! You just don't know about them because you're not a thief. Well, if you are one, and you don't know, then you are very much of a loner, am I right? Although, it seems like we've become a bit too relaxed and let our trails become a bit sloppy.

It's just your usual club with a bar and some dancing, but mostly with business transactions. We trade and buy all of our precious possessions. For me, I had a lovely but rude young woman who was interested in what I stole. I'm not saying I purposefully stole it before her in order to offer it to her for a large amount of money; I'm just saying that I happened to find it first, and she'd be interested in it.

Once I found the woman sitting at a table alone, looking down at a journal of some sort, I sat down across from her and greeted, "Bela, my dear." I gave the woman a mocking smile.

"Hello, Crowley," she grimaced when she heard my voice and looked up. "I was hoping it would be someone else sitting there," she admitted with that attitude that I don't really appreciate.

"No, no, not today—you definitely  _do_ want me here, right in front of you," a devilish grin appeared o my face. "You just don't know it yet."

"Oh?" she retorted, a curious look on her face, but still keeping her guard up, "And why might that be?" she put a hand up to her chin and rested it there.

"I have something you want," I stated as-a-matter-of-factly.

"Oh, how could you  _possibly_ , you no good for—"

"Ah-ah-ah," I interrupted her, wagging my finger with each syllable, my voice almost in a sing-song tune, "You don't want to insult the person who has a good deal for you."

Silence. Good. Her eyes were attentive as they tried to pierce through mine.

I patted the table in front of me with both hands and leaned forward, whispering, "I have that necklace that you've been searching so thoroughly for—yes, that priceless, diamond necklace. What is its name again? Oh, the Halo, am I right?"

Her breath hitched. "You weren't supposed to know about that," she hissed silently as she leaned forward as well. She looked like she was going to try to kill me. How adorable. (Note the sarcasm there).

"The 'not supposed to' is what we all do, honey," I clicked my tongue against my teeth as I shrugged slightly in an "oh well" manner. "I just happen to be very smart and followed your tracks easily. They don't call me the 'Thief of Hell' for nothing." I eyed her; she was ready to scratch my eyes out, but she had composure, I'll give her that.

"How did you get it?" she asked through gritted teeth and tightened facial muscles.

"It doesn't matter  _how I did_ ; it matters  _if you will_. Why don't you just listen to what I've got to say?" I reached into one of my pockets to pull out a scrap piece of paper and a pen to write with. She fidgeted in her seat as she tried to not make any type of commotion. It was a lot of fun watching her struggle under my metaphorical grip. She's given me such trouble that she deserves some of her own, don't you agree?  _Please_ , don't try to act all self-righteous—we always, at some point, want revenge on someone, darling. Admit it. Oh, but I am veering away from the subject!

"This priceless necklace for this much," I wrote a large amount of money on the paper and passed it over to her. When she tried to object, I reminded her that she would probably make tons more than that, were she to accept my offer.

"Putting a price on a priceless object," Bela scoffed.

"You are planning on doing the same, love," I snickered.

She sighed. "Fair enough," was her reply. She started to search through her wallet for the money, but then paused, a spark of distrust found in her eyes. "Not until you show it to me and let me examine it. Don't want it to be a fake."

"Now, darling, you mistrust me? How offending!" I faked to have been hurt, "All right, all right. But no touching. You tend to have sticky fingers. Things that touch you don't ever see the light of day ever again." I took out the necklace and unwrapped it from the tissue paper I enclosed it in. "Here. See? I even took the paper that talks about this necklace being stolen. Of course they won't admit it's priceless in the papers—that would be very unwise. But look at the pictures. You will know." I slapped the newspaper onto the table for her to see.

She reluctantly looked at the paper, reading the article for a bit, and studying the pictures. She then looked over at the necklace I was holding right in front of her, and I could tell she starved for it just like a fish starves for its pieces of garbage being thrown into its bowl. How pathetic. Still, pathetic is what's giving me money; you don't hear  _me_ complaining.

"Okay, you're right. It can only be this one. A replica would be almost impossible, and if possible, it would look so fake that it would break with one look of the eye," I could see that she felt the wave of defeat overcome her as she looked up at me angrily. She handed me the money, and I made sure to count it all before I handed her the necklace. Once I was certain that this money was real and correct, I slid it across from the table and she clutched it desperately, hiding it quickly in her outrageously large purse.

"Is that all?" she asked coldly.

"Yes, ma'am, that is all," I smiled at her, quickly sliding off of my seat and taking off from the table after stuffing the money into my inner jacket pocket. I simply  _despise_ the woman, but I can't keep myself from dealing with her if it results in big money.

As soon as I made my way to the bar, there was a shout at the front of the club, and a commotion started at the door. "What the  _hell_ —"

Sirens. Lots of them.

_Well, shite! The_ cops _? What are they doing here?_ I thought to myself. I had never heard of the police finding any of our bars—and, of course, there is always a first to everything, but it was still shocking nonetheless.

Bela was, of course, nowhere to be seen. She is a quick little bitch who knows how to stay out of trouble's way when it comes knocking on her door. There was too much going on that I couldn't find my way out of the crowd. I was literally pinned shoulder-to-shoulder in the meddling mess of people. Cops were spewing in from all over the place, and I cursed under my breath while I tried to squeeze my way out.

After succeeding to get out of the suffocation zone, I heard a voice yell at me: "Stop it right there!"

Being the gentleman I am, I raised my hands up in the air.

"Turn around so I can see you!" the voice sounded a bit uneasy. Well, yes, in this type of commotion, maybe—but seriously, most thieves don't go killing off people when they are found out. They are smarter than that.

I turned around with an apologetic look on my face. "Oops, I did it again," I spoke out loud when I realized whom I was staring at. "Hello, again," I smiled casually.

"I—What. You?!" There we go! The oh-so-familiar growling and rasping voice greeted me. "What in the world are you doing here?" he yelled over the sounds of the crowd. Time seemed to freeze around us—almost like in a romance movie, isn't that right?—while I just stared at the astonished look on his face.

"I think it is quite obvious why, sweet Officer Castiel," I raised my eyebrows, with a satisfied look on my face. Watching his entire body sway from the realization that he let the thief go away the other day was really delightful, really. His muscles were tense, and he looked like he was going to faint; though, he quickly regained his control.

"Come right over h-here, Crowley," he ordered, gesturing towards him.

"Now, now, Castiel, hearing you bark orders at me with that voice  _and_ saying my name? It gives me goose bumps!" I kept on grinning while I willingly walked over to him, just as he ordered.

"This is not something to joke about," he replied, his face flushing as he  _obviously_  didn't know how to react to a person as charming as me.

"Oh, I'm not joking," I raised one eyebrow at him. He was taller than me, but I felt as if he was almost four feet smaller than me. What can I say? I have a huge personality.

"Just give me your hands so I can cuff you," he tried to ignore my irresistible attempts.  _Unsuccessfully_ , I might add. Either way, though, I followed his orders, putting my hands behind my back. What, I'm a thief, but I have  _some_  decency. And, well, some plans in my head, too; but that's besides the point!

We left the bar, leaving the other cops who were trying to get a hand on at least one thief, but most of them not succeeding. Many of my fellow acquaintances stopped to look at me, most smirking, for they knew that I would not give up easily. I am, after all, the  _Thief of Hell_.

Just when we were alone and approaching Castiel's police car, I decided to strike up some conversation. "So, how did you all find this place, sweetie?"

"We are not in a situation to be talking right now. You are the one who stole the necklace the other day and I let you go. I think it is better that you and I don't speak," he replied, his entire face red from embarrassment. I couldn't blame him for letting me go, though—I was only a charming lad who happened to be at the mall at a strange time. Nothing else suspicious.

"Oh, but we had such a nice chat that other day," I almost whined. He opened the back door of his car and allowed me to go in myself. I commented on how he was a gentleman—a gorgeous one, at that—and he asked me to stop talking. Can you believe that? The poor boy was  _asking me_  to do something. I still don't understand how he got into the police business, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't glad he did, because that led me to meeting him.

While he drove me to the police station, he was completely quiet. I also had just noticed that he was actually wearing a hat that time. I tried to bring up some casual conversations, but he didn't seem very conversational. He did, though, every so often look behind him, and I would smile at him. He would quickly turn back to watch where he was going, but I could tell the hairs on the back of his neck were sticking up, and I could see goose bumps forming all over.

Good to know that he got that impression from me. I wouldn't want it in any other way, honestly—now would I, darlings?


	3. Pride is Merely a Sign of Success

            We finally reached the local police station, and Castiel put his car in park, looking behind him and right at me. I was sitting comfortably in the back, minding my own business and observing the inside of the car. I looked over at him and smiled without saying a word.

            He kept staring at me, unsure of what to say, so I interrupted his thoughts: "Officer… Now, don't get me wrong—I know you know your job and I shouldn't be asking you because I'm sure you are going to—but isn't this the part where you take me out of the car and stuff me into one of those filthy cells in the station?"

            He shifted uncomfortably in his seat as he eyed me, "Why didn't you fight back?"

            "What, and get my clothes wrinkled or ripped in the process? I also wouldn't want to hurt you and your pretty face," I added the last part with a grin.

            His face was full of confusion, "But why?"

            "Oh, for goodness sake!" I wiggled my shoulders in frustration since I could not move my trapped hands behind me. "Because. I like you. I didn't see hurting you as an option."

            Castiel chuckled, shaking his head and looking down, "How can a  _thief_ like a  _cop_?"

            " _Thief_ is such an insulting word. I would take offense to that if it wasn't you talking, my dear Cas," was all I said in reply.

            The cute officer's eyes widened slightly as he scoped the car as if anyone else could be overhearing our conversation in there. "You should not talk to me in that way."

            "In what way?"

            "The way you have been talking to me."

            "I don't see how I'd talk any differently."

            "I mean the way you have been very  _informal_ with me," he croaked.

            "Oh, that's what you people call it?" I kept smiling and crossed one leg over the other. I could tell he was clenching his teeth together tightly because his jaw muscles were working very hard under his skin.

            "You know you can get in trouble for that, and even get a longer time in jail, right?" Castiel let out softly, as if it were a secret.

            "Now, now, Cas, I know who to speak to in this way. I know you're the type of person who wouldn't try to get me in trouble for it." He shifted in his seat as I watched him. "Am I right?"

            "Unless you got overbearing, I believe so, yes…" I could tell he was getting more and more uncomfortable with the situation. I did also notice, though, that he did nothing in his power to stop it. Which he could do easily, you know, since he was a cop and all. He turned off the car and finally walked out, opening my door for me.

            As soon as I started to move, he grabbed my arm by the bicep, I guess, for assurance. He wanted to make sure I wouldn't run away, and I was okay with that, seeing as how his arm was practically locking mine. I'm sorry, if you haven't noticed, I'd taken a liking to this beautiful mess dragging me off towards my cell.

*******

            I was put in a nifty, old cell—the bed didn't feel too uncomfortable, and it was also really public. Anyone would be able to see me there, no matter what I was doing. I shrugged, not really caring; it wasn't even like they got to my money. Oh, for heaven's sake, no! I made sure to hide that buggar right after receiving it. They weren't looking for that money, per se, but more for that necklace that I sold to that lovely lady whom I'd rather see in a ditch than in the same room as me. They questioned me and I told them everything that wouldn't hurt me, like where my house was. I made sure to keep all the dirty work away from home. That way, were anything like  _this_ to happen, it would be all dandy if the police decided to give the place a little visit.

            After it was apparent that I had nothing in my house, they decided to pay me another visit. I sighed and sat up from the rather-comfy-considering bed but then smiled when I noticed who was standing in front of me and next to the Sheriff.

            "We would like another word with you," the Sheriff looked at me with cold eyes. I glanced over at Castiel who was just… Standing there. He had a determined look on his face—determined for what, I had no idea. He seemed a bit calmer than how he was in the car, but then again he was now with a superior to keep him safe from this _dangerous thief_. I smiled at the thought of it—at the thought that he could be scared of me.

            Once in the interrogation room, (oh, and don't forget nicely-tied-up-and-handcuffed-to-a-chair), the Sheriff stood by the door in the shadows. I waited for him to walk up, but it didn't seem like he was moving—although it was really hard to tell with the flickering light above us that was dimmer than a drunken man. What I  _could_ notice was that  _Officer Castiel_ was making his way towards me and sat down at the other side of the table. I then raised an eyebrow.

            He nervously looked over at the Sheriff, who seemed to have nodded his head. Once those scrumptious, baby blue eyes met with mine, he moved his gaze. It seemed like he was worried that I would steal his eyes away if he looked at me for too long. If he did think that, I would assure him that I would steal a lot more if he let me. But, anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself.

            "We searched your house and there was nothing there. You must have another place where you keep your stolen belongings," he started.

            "You can't prove that," I replied politely.

            "Unless you tell us about it," he continued.

            "Unless I actually don't have one."

            "I don't appreciate your circular logic," he replied, leaning forward.

            "You are the one who is pushing a subject that doesn't even exist," I leaned forward as well and looked up at him. He immediately leaned back and stared at his hands before him. He twiddled his thumbs for a bit, then intertwined his fingers and looked back up at me, almost shyly.

            "We can't really keep him locked up for a crime we have no concrete evidence for," the Sheriff sighed.

            "But, sir, I saw him at the mall the night of the crime—and then he was at a 'thieves only' pub that no one knows about except for the thieves themselves!" Cas stood up to face him.

            "Maybe I am an innocent bystander who noticed the crime and has been trying to crack it?" I suggested through a shrug, "Did you not consider that?"

            Castiel and the Sheriff exchanged looks, and then focused on me again. Well, I had a point, didn't I? They had no evidence against me, so I could just be someone trying to help. A little white lie doesn't affect anyone.  _In fact…_ I had a lovely idea.

            "I think I know who did it."

            "What?" They both looked at me as if I had seven heads.

            "Lovely young lady—she goes by many names. Christa, Jamie, Regina… Yadda yadda, and the list goes on. Many of the thieves seem to know her by one name, though: Bela Talbot. Look her up; I'm sure you'll find something."

            Castiel looked at me with disbelief. He knew that I was lying about me not being a thief— _hell_ , earlier I practically handed him a letter saying that. The Sheriff, though—no, he had no reason to doubt me. For all he knew, I was just a poor lad who got caught in a sticky mess due to some curiosity.

            "Sir—Crowley—If you wouldn't mind us keeping in touch with you? We'd like to know about this Bela. And even though we have no hard proof against you, you are still a hell of a suspect, so maybe you can prove yourself to us by looking into this whole deal since the thieves seem to trust you enough," the Sheriff asked. Oh,  _of course_ he wasn't asking. It was more of an order than anything. I know he wouldn't take no for an answer.  _Besides—_ it would only make me seem more suspicious. And, also, I didn't mind. I would always like to shed some light on the whereabouts of Miss Talbot. She brought enough trouble to me in the past than she was really worth. If this got me on good terms with the police, too, that was a plus.

            "Of course, Sheriff. Do you need my phone number?"

*******

            After ignoring Castiel's objections and telling him to stop worrying, the Sheriff ordered him to lead me outside,  _and_ uncuffed. Once we got outside, Castiel didn't let go of my arm—he turned the corner.

            "Weren't you supposed to let me—"

            Castiel shoved me against his car and held an arm up to my throat. " _What the hell do you think you're doing; lying to him like that?_ " he growled. Ow, ow! Him showing some dominance made me shiver with joy.

            "Hold on, dear, you're making me feel the butterflies; being so close," I replied with a grin on my face.

            "I'm not joking, Crowley. How the hell did you get to hide things so easily, and how did you get to convince him?" he whispered sharply, his eyes piercing into mine with no problem this time. Hn, funny how his personality changed so quickly. Not that I minded.

            "What? You didn't have sufficient evidence against me—no money, no damn jewelry—nothing in my house, either! I know that Bela has the necklace. I can help you reach her," I tried to push him off of me gently.

            "But you sold it to her, didn't you?" he growled.

            I was getting a bit tired of the games, so I looked at him with a serious face and replied: "Yes. But she is worth  _way_ more than I ever will be. She has hurt people, Cas, I just take what I need." I swear on my life and my mother and etc., etc., that this is the truth. Not everyone is a filthy crook. I am quite the clean one.

            He kept staring at me, but I could tell that the control he found was slipping through his fingers. "You could drag me back in the police office if you still want to fight to cage me in," I added. I could tell he was unwilling to do so because he loosened his grip on me. I then took that opportunity to grab his arm and keep him pressed against me. "Didn't think so."

            Letting go of me, he tried to pull away. I kept him there, and his eyes darted away from mine. "You are a lovely man, Castiel," I whispered to him as I pushed him off gently. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a piece of paper and a pen. I leaned it against the car and scribbled quickly on it, and then handed it to him.

            "What is this…?" his gravelly voice uttered slowly. His brows furrowed in confusion—it was quite cute.

            "Oh, nothing; just my number. Keep it or throw it away. You interest me.  _A lot_ ," I then moved my face closer to his; I observed the entirety of it. I then noticed that his pink, smooth and differently-but-in-no-way-badly-shaped lips looked even better under the dim lamppost light above us. I chuckled to myself at my silly thoughts, but _come on_ , this man was simply scrumptious and irresistible. I caught a whiff of his smell and was content with that for now. I could tell that I took him by surprise—he was frozen solid even after I moved away from him.

            "Good night to you,  _sweetie_ ," I saluted and walked off feeling cocky, prideful, and at the top of the world.


	4. The Dirty Thief and the Pretty Cop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I haven't updated on here in a while! I did a bit more on FF.net but was overwhelmed to continue on here since I currently have 12 chapters up. But! Here is another. Enjoy!
> 
> *** = time skip ; xxx = POV shift

            It was days later and I was in my house, sipping a hot cup of tea in front of my living room’s fireplace. My house is pretty big compared to the others in my neighborhood—I like living large.  I was resting on my black, leather armchair with my bulldog Growley resting on my lap. I was relaxed and reading a copy of a compilation of Edgar Allen Poe’s greatest works when my phone started vibrating. I ignored it to let it reach voicemail because, my word, it’s very annoying to get interrupted during a great read. Once there was silence, I smiled and continued reading, petting Growley gently on the head—

            The buzzing started again. Groaning to myself, I was hoping it wasn’t that really bothersome bitch. “’Ello, ‘tis Crowley,” I answered with an aggravated tone.

            “You bastard, what have you done?!”

            Ah, that annoying, screeching voice. Yes, it was Bela.

            “’Ello, Bela, nice to speak to you, too,” I rolled my eyes. “What is it, girl?”

            “What the hell did you do? I have the police on my tail! It smells rotten like you.” Her voice was cold and harsh. I could feel the death glare from the other side of the line.

            “What? I’m so sorry to hear that. I don’t know, maybe the police finally became competent and are actually doing their job now,” I smiled under my breath.

            “Don’t you lie; it has your dirty paws all over this,” she snapped.

            “Oh, all right, all right!” I started losing my patience, “Maybe I gave the police a little food for thought, but whatever they are doing right now is out of my hands. Now, if you think that you’re going to force me to help you, you are immensely mistaken, love. I _want_ to see you rot in jail. You’ve only brought me trouble.”

            “May I remind you that _I_ am the one who introduced you into this business? _I_ am the one who helped pick you up from that miserable life and—” she started.

            “What you may or may not have done in the past does not interest me. You’ve only been a pest to me throughout our entire business together. Goodbye, Bela.” With that, I hung up my phone and angrily placed it on the end table next to me. “What nerve,” I mumbled to myself, and then opened my book to continue reading.

            Before I got through the first sentence, though, my phone started to vibrate again. I picked it up violently and barked, “I already told you to buggar off, Bela!”

            “Uh, hello?” a nervous and different voice greeted me at the other end.

            I froze as I tried to gather my thoughts. Who was this…?

            “Who might this be?” I answered slowly.

            “Um, maybe this is a bad time. I knew I shouldn’t have called. I’ll just let you go—“ before the voice could finish, I recognized that gravelly voice.

            “Oh, Castiel, is that you?” I interrupted.

            “Yeah, I, uh… Didn’t mean to call this number, I’m sorry. I’ll just—”

            “What do you mean, you _didn’t mean to_? I gave you my number on a piece of paper. You would only be calling me on purpose, at this point, love,” I smiled. I heard some shuffling in the background, indicating that he was pacing the floor. “Where are you right now?” I asked, a bit curious.

            “At my house,” he hastily replied, “Um, look, I really didn’t mean to call you, so, I think it’d be better if we just hung up.” I could feel his anxiety through the phone.

            “Castiel, Castiel. You don’t call a man like me and then try to walk away. You called for a reason. What is it?” I looked at my nails for a split second and then continued petting Growley on the head. He wagged his tail happily.

            “You talked about that Bela woman, right? Well, we started looking into her life and things do seem suspicious. I, uh, figured that talking to you about it would help our investigation more,” he started to gain some confidence.

            “Talking over the phone is a bit dreary—why don’t we talk over a cup of tea or whiskey?”

            “I… I suppose we could,” his deep voice got softer.

            “Great! Get to Martini’s in exactly an hour. Sound like enough time to get your pretty self ready?”

            There was a silence at the other line before he let out a quick “yes, okay” and hung up right away. I smiled to myself and patted Growley on the back and he looked up at me.

            “I think I’m going somewhere, Growley. He talks business, but I feel like it’s more than that. And if not, I’ll make sure it’ll end that way.” I then pulled out my book to finish the paragraph I was on; then I’d be off.

*******

            I walked into the bar and immediately spotted dear Castiel. He was on one of the stools wearing a bit of a bizarre attire—a large, beige trench coat with a tux underneath. It was already a bit warm in this place; how he was dealing with the heat under all those layers was beyond me. He looked out of place in this environment, with his thumbs twiddling and his head jerking back and forth, watching everyone around him. I could tell I put him out of his misery when he saw me.

            “Oh, you’re here,” he shot me a side smile but quickly went back into a more serious composure.  “I thought you decided not to show up.”

            “Don’t you worry, I don’t go back on my word, lovely. Especially for you,” I replied with a smile on my face as I sat down on the stool next to him. “So, what can I do for ya?”

            He looked off to the side for a second, gathering his thoughts, I presumed. “Well, I was hoping you could give me more information on that Bela Talbot you talked about before…” His voice trailed off.

            “What information do ya need? I’m sure I’ll have something that can help.”

            “First, have you talked to her at all recently?” he looked up at me all serious-like. Oh, it was simply adorable. He leaned forward a bit, trying to keep the conversation a bit confidential from everyone else in the bar… Although I was pretty sure that it was too loud for anyone to even _accidentally_ eavesdrop.

            “Yes, actually. She called me right before you did. She already knows you and your friends are hot on her trail, and she seems very angered by it,” I chuckled at the fact that I was completely nonchalant about all this.

            “Did she mention any tactics or anything of the like?” Castiel tapped his fingers on the counter. He didn’t seem to like the information I had just relayed to him.

            “I didn’t… entirely let her,” I chose my words carefully, “I hung up on her because she was getting very rude with me.”

            “You didn’t seize the opportunity to find out anything?” he shifted his position and tapped the counter even more, an intense look on his face.

            “Look, honey, I already have information that is enough for you to have the right to pursue her. I did not realize that I was supposed to be following her myself—isn’t that your job? If you need me to do that work for you as well, dear, you should have just asked me. I can work my magic and find out her coordinates in a blink of an eye.” I then raised an eyebrow.

            He gave out a small sigh and was silent for a few moments. He then, instead of answering my question, stated, “Let me go with you.”

            “Pardon?” I blinked, slightly confused with his statement.

            “I hate sitting behind a desk, trying to figure out things from an outside perspective. I want to actually be of some help—I want to go out and actually _do_ something. You’re obviously doing more than we’re ever going to do.” His voice was then more frantic and his words careless.

            I was impressed and pleased with his reply. “You do realize that actually _doing_ something will require to sometimes get dirty? It can also get very dangerous if you are not careful,” I warned him.

            I could sense a change in his demeanor. He seemed determined, and I liked that. He fixed a stern stare at me and only nodded. “I understand that there are certain consequences that may occur due to my involvement with you,” was his reply.

            Always replying in long, unnecessary sentences was a very cute trait of his. I nodded back at him. “I won’t lie to you: I am a dirty thief. Working with me means that you have to learn certain tactics to get what you want.”

            Castiel scratched the side of his face and ran his hand through his hair. “I understand, Crowley.” His voice ended deeper than usual—oh, how I love that voice!

            “It is settled, then?” I asked, my hand out in front of me, waiting for the shake. He took my hand quickly and we shook on it. “Now,” I smiled, “Why don’t we actually get to the drinking part?” I called out to the bartender for two glasses of whiskey.

            “I’m not really sure I shou—” he started.

            “Wow, you policemen are boring! C’mon, now, have a drink! I told you that things will be different for you from here on out,” I retorted while the bartender slid the drinks towards us. “Drink up, Cassie!”


	5. How to be a Thief, Step One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am finally back to update you guys on the 7 or so chapters that I already had on FF.net, and I just finished chapter 13!!! Happy reading!
> 
> Please remember that "xxx" is a POV shift whereas "***" is a time skip!

            It had been a week since and I formed our “partnership” (or whatever you’d like to call it) and we finally set up to meet up again at Martini’s. This time, I was the one waiting—honestly, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he got cold feet and didn’t show up. He did, though, end up showing up just a few minutes later.

            “Hello, Crowley,” I heard that well-known voice behind me.

I turned around from the barstool and smiled, “Ah, Castiel. I was starting to think you bailed out on me.”

“I wouldn’t back out on something like this, don’t worry,” he attempted at a reassuring smile in return, but I could tell that he was still a bit nervous.

“So, I need to teach you the tricks to being practical, right?” I asked while I slid him a drink that I had bought for him. I could sense a smirk about to happen.

“You mean _stealing_ , right?” he took the glass and tapped it with his right index finger once before taking a sip and sitting down. I chuckled and noticed as he licked his lips in thought and couldn’t help but appreciate those seemingly soft, pink and oddly-but-magnificently-shaped lips. He also noticed that I grew quiet and started searching for a new sentence.

            I decided to take that opportunity to speak, “I’m going to bring you to each of the places I frequent and also introduce you to everyone… But you have to make sure that you talk and act in a… Less authority manner, yeah?” I winked at him.

            “Right…” he chuckled a bit, starting to loosen up a bit, “I’ll try my best.” He then cleared his throat after thinking for a few moments. “What about Bela?”

            “Her whereabouts are unknown at the moment, and she knows the police is onto her. It’ll be a bit tough to find her, which is fine, though, because we’ve got you and me on her trail. We’ll get to it just right after I’m done fitting you in with the crowd, dearie,” I responded.

 

*******

 

            I first made sure we’d fix his appearance (however nice it was) so he didn’t look entirely clumsy or too official-like. I dragged the blue eyes to a place called Hot Topic—surely you lovelies have heard of it? I threw him a black buttoned-down shirt and a pair of jeans and sneakers that were very expensive, might I add.

            He walked into the changing room while I waited outside the door. “You can afford this?”

            I laughed wholeheartedly at the joke, “Of course, darling. My profession allows it.” I knew I couldn’t see him, but I could just imagine a stern look of disapproval on that lovely face of his. I looked into one of the full-length mirrors that was next to me and licked my fingers and then smoothed out my hair while I waited. “You almost done, Prince?” I smiled smugly while waiting for a reply.

            I heard a sigh of annoyance and he walked out of the room with a frustrated look on his face. “I’ve not worn this much casual clothing even in my own house,” he grunted, trying to fold the collar of his shirt. I slapped those hands away and made the back stick up and not tuck in. He scowled at me and ran his hand through his hair to neaten it a bit.

            “Castiel, how many days off have you gotten in the past 10 years?” I asked half-jokingly.

            “I’m… not sure… Not very many,” he replied seriously.

            “Ah,” I scratched the back of my neck, “Well, you have a lot to get used to, then!” I patted him on the back. “Let’s go! Go ahead and put it on my bill, Lilith.”

            “Of course, Crowley. Hope to see you again soon,” the cashier I’ve always seen there with long, blonde curls and usually wearing all red waved at us as we walked out.

            “I look ridiculous. Are you sure Lilith is a good opinion?” Cas looked at me while we continued walking.

            “Lilith is very charming and has great taste in clothes. I trust in her opinions,” I put my hand to my chest in an offended fashion, but he seemed to not notice, or at least not take heed. “Well, _anyway_ , it’s time for you to now learn about our environments. Thieves don’t steal and hide in the corners of an alleyway—no, no! We have class, and we meet up with class. Just you wait and see,” I put my arm around his shoulders to lead the way. He seemed to flinch slightly at the touch but didn’t move away, so I took the opportunity and didn’t let go.

 

*******

            We finally reached one of the many top-secret bars that I attend on a weekly basis. Within the first step of the room, we were approached.

            “Hello, Crowley. Who is this new guy you got with ya?” A woman with wavy, brown hair down to her shoulders and a pale face with a wide jaw but delicate features approached me. “Ah, ‘ello, Megan,” I waved slightly and pulled Cas by the arm to continue walking without carrying on the conversation, but—

            “My name’s _Meg_ , not Megan, you flirt; I thought you knew that by now,” she smirked and followed close behind.

            Smiling at Cassie in a way I did not entirely enjoy, Meg reached her hand out to him and continued speaking, “He-llo, Clarence, nice to meet ya.”

            “My name’s not Clarence. It’s Castiel,” he furrowed his brow in confusion but still took her hand to shake with slight hesitation.

            “How come I’ve never seen him around before, Crowley? He new?” she tilted her head to the side and observed the man. “I’m sorry, Castiel, I don’t mean to be rude; I’m just… a curious person,” she smiled and then laughed slightly.

            Meg is a nice thief—for a lack of better words—but she has a way of finding out my secrets and I would rather no one find out about this. Excuse me, I needed everything to my advantage, you know.

            “Nothing interesting here, poppet. He is new, yes, and I’m just showing him around, since he doesn’t know anyone else,” I tried ending the conversation.

            “How’d he only know you? I’ve never seen you walk around with anyone unless there was something to your advantage—no offense,” she put her hand on my shoulder.

            “None taken—ah—now, Meg, honestly, if you will excuse us. We’ll see you around—”

            “Actually, Crowley, I’ve heard how you set the police on Bela,” Meg bit her tongue playfully, ignoring my interest in walking away. “Should any of us be worried about a police man hot on our trail?” she teased.

            “No, not unless I’ve got a beef with you, which I do not,” I chuckled and noticed that Castiel’s eyes widened at the mention of Bela and the police.

            “Clarence, you okay over there? Don’t worry, Crowley won’t sick them on you if that’s what you’re worried about. He seems to like you, and I can see why,” Meg put a hand to her hip and flashed him a smile. Castiel smiled back nervously.

            “All right, I’ll let you two have _alone time_ and I’ll catch you later. Tata, Crowley—and _goodbye_ Clarence,” Meg waved and walked away happily.

            “She seems nice,” Castiel said slowly, “But she doesn’t realize my name is not Clarence.”

            “Just be careful—thieves are thieves no matter what. You can never trust them one hundred percent,” I pulled him by the arm away from the crowd in the middle of the room.

            “Including you?”

            I smirked and winked at him, “It wouldn’t be complete fun if you could trust me one hundred percent, aren’t I right, love?”


	6. Be a Thief to Know a Thief

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember: "***" means time skip and "xxx" means POV shift!

            While introducing Cas to the ways of the thief, I realized there was one thing I was missing. Yes, he knew where to go and saw things from an external perspective _but_ he did not understand how a thief’s mind works. I decided I needed to add one more step to his “conversion,” so to speak. I wasn’t entirely sure how he would take it; I was expecting some sort of cute objection from the little angel. And I was right.

            “You want me to do _what_?!” Castiel’s voice cracked from surprise.

            We were at my most frequented house and sitting down on one of the couches with Growley climbing all over Cassie’s lap. The dog knows what’s valuable, just like me.

            “Darling, I’m telling you: this is the best way for you to understand a thief and be able to track down Bela easily,” I crossed my legs and rested my arms on the back of the couch.

            “I thought we were tracking Bela and not turning me into a criminal,” he shouted nervously. I could tell that he was not expecting this at all. Poor sweetie. I really felt bad—excuse me, don’t doubt me! I may be a thief, but I have sympathy, too.

            “It’ll only be a very small heist, Cassie; I promise,” I smiled, trying to relax him a bit.

            “Crowley,” he started, “If I were any whoever at whatever job then _maybe_ it wouldn’t be as big of a deal—but I’m a trusted officer! This would be entirely against all of the codes I swore by!”

            “Love, don’t worry so much about it. I’ll be doing most of it. I will just need you to help with a few things.”

            “That’s still being an accomplice, which is _bad_ ,” he frowned and then pinched the bridge of his nose with his left hand while the other rested on Growley’s head.

            “It’s not all that bad. I know how to cover my tracks, sweetie. We could just have you be the brains of the ‘assignment’ and I’ll be doing the dirty work,” I winked at him, but I could tell his anxiety didn’t lessen. “Why are you so interested in finding Bela, though?”

            “I already told you. I’m always behind a desk and not going out and actually doing anything productive,” he looked up at me with those baby blue eyes.

            “Yes, but you could do that on your own without me, yeah?”

            He looked down and continued petting Growley for a while before replying at all. “Well—er, I’d have no way to know what to do… Not like Sheriff Singer or Sheriff Mills would ever let me go out on a quest like that. I had no other choice,” he glanced over at me quickly before shooting his focus back at Growley.

            “Was Singer the one I met when you arrested me?” I asked, curiously.

            “Yes,” Castiel replied.

            “Ah. He’s very charming.”

            I heard a chuckle emanate from the brown-haired anxiety-mess next to me. I raised an eyebrow, pleased that at least he was more comfortable around me.

            “You promise that we won’t get caught?” He seemed to be giving in, thankfully. I didn’t want it all to end right there.

            “We will not get caught. They don’t call me the _Thief of Hell_ for nothing,” I patted him on the shoulder and gave him a slight squeeze (where I could feel those marvelous muscles) to reassure him. He gave me a side smile and scratched his jaw, obviously not sure what else to say. “It’s settled, then? Can I give you the goal and you be the mastermind behind this heist?”

            “We have no other way, right?” he smirked.

            “That’s the spirit, baby,” I laughed and I could hear another chuckle from him that sounded a little more wholehearted than usual.

 

*******

 

            I left my thief-in-training alone for a bit after I told him the goal for the heist. I gave him papers to draw or write his plans on and let him be until he called me over again.

            “Crowley, I think I may have a good plan,” he called out to me while I finished putting together a snack for the two of us. I walked out with sashimi and placed it on the coffee table in front of us. “Very good, darling,” I looked over at his work and casually placed an arm around his shoulder as if to support myself while I leaned forward to get a better look. He shifted his position a bit, bewildered by my actions, but soon shook it off and went back to his work. I know; I’m a sneaky bastard. Please hold the applause, dearies.

            “I never realized how much being in the police force could help me with this. You know, with entrances and things like that…” He then furrowed his brow when he realized just what he was saying. He shook his head to get back into focus and pointed to a blue sheet of paper that I had not supplied him with.

            “What is that?” I asked, intrigued and feeling excited for this event already.

            “I took the liberty of using your laptop over there and researching for the blueprint of the museum,” he tried not to smile with pride.

            “Excuse me, how in the world did you get that so easily?”

            “You’re not the only one who has your ways,” was all Castiel said in reply. I stared at him for a few moments, a bit shocked, but he seemed to not pay attention and just continued to speak: “I found a few easy entrances throughout the sides where there is usually no heavy security (since no one really knows of it), and this floor plan specifies exactly where the oldest bone ever found will be located. It’s sort of in the middle of the museum, so we’ll have to be really careful when maneuvering around.

            “The security room is over here,” he pointed to another corner of the map, “Which I can probably hack into from a distance and just give you enough time to swipe it away.” He looked up at me, waiting for my approval or dissatisfaction.

            “That sounds easy enough. You have hacking skills, eh?” I shook him slightly, still keeping my arm closely around his shoulder. He blushed slightly out of embarrassment, “When I was younger, I had a bit of an interest in this sort of thing. I guess me turning into a cop is a bit ironic.”

            “Ironic, indeed. All right, Castiel. Show me everything in detail,” I let go of his shoulder and sat next to him, my elbows resting on my legs as I leaned forward to watch the plan closely.

            “Okay, so this is what we’ll be doing…”

 

*******

            Once the plan was all in order—which was a splendid plan, I must say—we stayed at my house until it was around two in the morning. We took a cruise in my crimson red Lincoln, which includes multiple screens and a computer and different gadgets and thieving-things in the backseat to fulfill my heart’s desire. Castiel sat in there in wonder as he realized this was the car I was in when he first met me.

            “Never would have guessed, yeah?” I grinned as I jumped in the driver’s seat. “All right, we’ll have to make sure we park somewhere a good distance from here which will not be suspicious at all,” I said half to myself.

            We found a little strip of stores that are open 24/7 along with a friendly bar in the corner. “I think this will fit just right,” I said as I pulled into a random parking spot.

            “Will you be okay walking over there by yourself?” Castiel asked quickly, almost as if he didn’t realize those words were coming out of his mouth.

            “Why, you make me feel all tingly when you worry about me, hon.”

            “I-I just meant that—you won’t get caught easily, right?” He didn’t really expect my response either.

            “Love, I’ve been doing this for a very long time. I know how to handle this. Just worry about how you’re doing, my thief-in-training,” I turned around to face him and he scowled at the nickname. He threw the earpiece and mic at my face as if in a child’s fit, which I found very amusing. “Thanks,” I replied as I reached towards him and messed up his hair before walking out of the car without looking back. I could only imagine that little look of disapproval on his face, and it pleased me.

            “Can you hear me?” I heard his gravelly voice through the earpiece.

            “Loud and clear, lovely.” I continued walking and slipped into the trees that were surrounding the place.

            It was a simply boring trek towards the museum, so I will spare you a waste of time. Once I reached the museum, Castiel started speaking to me as if he could tell where I was.

            “I do,” he stated as-a-matter-of-factly, “I made sure to turn on the GPS and camera on the set I gave you.”

            “Where in the world did you get that? Never mind—don’t answer that. We have more pressing matters to worry about. So here’s where the supposed side entrance is?”

            “Yes. It may sort of just look like there’s a random lock there, but it _is_ a door. Lock picking it should be easy—”

            “Of course it’ll be easy. You’re forgetting who you’re talking to, Cassie,” I scoffed. I put on gloves, found the lock and started working at it. Within less than a few seconds, I had it done. “Told you,” I added, feeling a bit cocky.

            Ignoring any retort Castiel had, I walked inside the dark and cold room. It looked like it was used for storage, so everything was cluttered. It was also a bit cramped, so I had to be careful while maneuvering around the boxes and rickety, metal shelves. “You’d think they’d take care of the place a bit more,” I mused.

            “What?” the charming voice from the other end piped up.

            “No need for alarm; I was only talking to myself.”

            I reached outside the room and looked around. It looked pretty empty to me—maybe only one person on watch. I’ve robbed many places before, so I was used to expecting security at certain places. Castiel was very helpful with the “careful around here”s and “look out for sensors around here”s and occasional “watch out for that security camera”s.

            There was a guard walking around, but come on; it was so easy to pass by her. She was obviously tired and not expecting anything to happen as it was always boring for years. I slipped into the shadows and waited for her to pass by with her dim flashlight. I walked around behind her and across the walls. I eventually got away from her and reached my final destination. “He-llo, beautiful,” I exclaimed under my breath.

            “Crowley, there are security sensors all around here. Let me try to temporarily disable them.” I then heard furious typing and a few moments later the voice came back, whispering, “You have three minutes. Do it _now_.”

            To no one’s surprise, I swiftly got into the glass box without breaking it and replaced the priceless bone with a chicken leg where Castiel calculated a weight equivalent to that of the bone I just took so the sensors wouldn’t notice a weight change once they came back on. After seamlessly going through the process without breaking even a little sweat, I rushed out of the scene of the crime.

            There was another guard on watch, but that was even easier a task. He seemed to be dozing off against a plastic chair that was leaning against one of the walls right across from me. I passed by him with ease and reached the storage room effortlessly.

            Once I reached the car, I could see Castiel’s anxious eyes looking for me. Once he saw me approaching the car, I noticed his body loosen and he leaned back against the seat.

            I jumped into the driver’s seat and looked at Cas through the rearview mirror. “You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

            “I was just worried the whole time that this plan wasn’t going to work… Are you sure that this was completely necessary for me learning how to track Bela undercover with you?” He was breathing as if he had run a marathon.

            “That was the only way, love. And you’ve proven that you know how to do it. You’ve just gone through the last step on how to be a thief. How do you feel?”

            “Dirty,” he admitted, but then a grin appeared on his face as he started to laugh.

            “Come on—let’s go celebrate! We’ll worry about this little buggar and sell tomorrow,” I said as I put the car in reverse.

            “How about we just relax?” Castiel asked, putting his hands behind his head.

            “Need me to drop you off at home?” I pulled out of the parking spot and went into the road.

            “Nah; we can relax together. We never actually ate the sashimi you put together. Wouldn’t want that to go to waste.” He then closed his eyes—I could tell he was tired. I was a bit confused, though, that he didn’t want to disappear and not see me until we had to work on our search for Bela. Of course I didn’t mind, sillies—I was just surprised.

            “Ah—you serious? Okay, that’s fine.” I couldn’t really find the words to reply to his comment. With that, I drove us back to my house in silence.

 

**xxx**

 

            “Hey, Sammy. We have some news.”

            “What is it?”

            “Looks like someone hit the local museum sometime last night or this morning without anyone noticing. Looks like everything is in tip-top shape—nothing was damaged or anything. The only difference is the fact that a priceless, ancient bone from too many years ago to count was replaced with a chicken leg.”

            My name’s Sam Winchester, and the shorter guy with spiked, brown hair and green eyes is my brother Dean. We’re bounty hunters.

            “Sounds like our job,” Dean stretched as he threw the newspaper onto the cheap table—that seems like it’s going to break at any second—supplied in the motel room.

            “Sounds like our _guy_ ,” I replied, running my hand through my hair.

            “You mean the _Thief of Hell_? Yeah, sounds like him to be a nit-picky sonuvabitch when it comes to stealing.”

            We don’t really live anywhere anymore. We live on the road and go from motel to motel tracking down criminals, and we’ve kind of had an amazement with this _Thief of Hell_ —whoever they were. We had nothing but speculations at that point and thousands of different images that people have described for his appearance. However, we _did_ know his ways and understood how to track his work. Since we weren’t on any tight schedule where we had to search for a murderer or serial killer, we went on our long-term search for this man—or woman, actually. We honestly had no clue of sex either.

            “Let’s go talk to the people from the museum?” I suggested.

            “I thought you’d never ask,” Dean grinned at me and we took off on his Impala ’67 towards our destination. We were determined to find this person; whoever they were.


	7. Complication is a Bitch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember: "xxx" = POV shift ; "***" = time skip

            I honestly could not believe what I did the night before. It was completely against all that I had worked for—it was something incredibly unlawful and uncalled for. Yet, there I was; waking up from the couch of a house that was not mine, and not entirely feeling guilty for helping a criminal get away with something just so I could “understand how a thief’s mind works.”

            I felt my heart rate rise as I realized I wasn’t in my own bed, but then remembered that I got too tired to head back home, and so I slept uncomfortably on Crowley’s couch. I scratched my head and then rubbed my eyes, squinting from the first sight of sun.

            I walked around the large house in search of Crowley, but he was nowhere to be found. I reached the kitchen and noticed a green stickynote pad on the counter with some writing on it. I rubbed my eyes more to take away the blur in my vision and stared at the paper until I could read it.

 

            _Cassie,_

 _I’m out to find a buyer for the bone—I’ll see you around._  
            _Stick around if you’d like, but it looks like you got a call_  
_from the police station (your phone was ringing while I_  
_was leaving). You may want to hurry on over there. It’s_  
_probably  about the  mysterious disappearance of  the_  
_bone. Don’t worry about the door; it will lock after you_  
_walk out._

_Tata,_

_Crowley_

 

            Reading about the station calling me caused me to panic. I rushed over to my phone to check to see when they called. It was around two hours ago, and the current time was ten in the morning. I _was_ supposed to have the day off, but it looked like I caused this to happen. I then noticed that they left a voicemail—I checked it quickly.

            _“Officer Castiel—This is Sheriff Mills. I need you here as soon as you can, you hear? We have something that came up that we need your help with. We also have two people we need you to meet.”_

            I could tell that my heart wasn’t going to stop racing anytime soon. I took a deep breath and started to call back while I ran over to my car—which wasn’t actually there. I had forgotten that Crowley picked me up—

            “Castiel, glad to hear from you,” Sheriff Mills’ voice interrupted my next panic attack.

            “Hello, Sheriff. I slept a little later than expected and didn’t worry since I wasn’t to go to the station today,” I tried to let out as smoothly as possible.

            “You still sound pretty tired. Can you make it over now?”

            “Yes, I believe I can arrive there soon but, I… I need to get ready first,” I said as I realized I had none of my things with me.

            “Just make it here as soon as you can and I’ll be happy. Talk to you later,” she rushed through her words and hung up. It seemed as though she was in a hurry to hang up so she could continue talking to someone who was there with her. Maybe it was those two people she said I was to meet. Either way, I needed to rush, but had no clue how I was going to. I couldn’t exactly run home and then run to the station. That would take a total of an hour or more.

            Since this house of Crowley’s was located in a gated community, I decided to talk to the guard at the gate to ask for bus information.

            “Hello, I have a question,” I asked.

            “Hello, sir! How can I help you?” she asked pleasantly.

            “Yes, actually. Is there a bus that comes here often, or do you have a bus schedule or maybe know the nearest—”

            “I’m sorry to interrupt, but are you Castiel?”

            I stared at her for a moment, a bit confused. “Yes, I am Castiel… How did you know?”

            “You fit the description Mr. Crowley left of you perfectly,” she smiled at me.

            “I—”

            “He asked me to tell you that he left his car here for you. Oh, and here are the keys!” She tossed them across the counter of the security booth. “The only other thing he said was to ‘not worry; I will get it back from you later. Just give me a call.’ And, oh, there’s a keychain with a number on it with the keys that says where his parking spot is.”

            “Oh,” I was at a loss for words, “Thank you, uh, Miss—?”

            “Naomi, if you please,” she smiled again.

            “Yes, thank you… Naomi,” I smiled back as I rushed over, looking for the parking space. I finally found it, but noticed this was another car. It was a black Camry, looking like it was from maybe 2012. _Well,_ I thought to myself, _I guess that he has the money to have multiple cars._ Anyway, I jumped into the car and went straight for my house so I could quickly shower and change into my uniform.

 

*******

 

            I arrived at the station around a half hour after talking to Sheriff Mills and rushed inside to find her standing there with two men in suits. One was the height of a skyscraper, and the other one was not as tall but definitely had more height than me. When the door closed behind me, the three of them turned around, making me feel a bit awkward.

            “Ah, this is Officer Castiel. Castiel, these are private investigators Sam and Dean Winchester,” Sheriff Mills gestured to the two.

            “Hello, nice to meet you,” I tried to smile as I took their hands one after another to shake.

            “Same here,” the one Mills pointed to as Sam replied with a smile.

            “Yep,” was all that Dean said. He seemed a lot more reserved.

            “I want you three to become close friends really soon because I need you to work together on this case,” she clasped her hands together. I was hoping she wasn’t talking about the stolen bone.

            “What case are we talking about?” I asked, hoping to dear God that I didn’t have to deal with what I thought I had to.

            “Didn’t you hear about the stolen artifact from the local museum?” Mills lifted an eyebrow. Of course it would be about the bone— _what else would it be?_ I mentally kicked myself for being so naïve.

            “Ah, yes—I saw it in passing in the newspaper when I was getting ready,” I felt my heart rate rise again. _Good thing nobody can see or hear it_.

            “If I didn’t know any better, I would say that this incident really shocked you,” Dean mentioned with a serious look on his face with his eyebrows slightly furrowed.

            “Well, yes, I mean… Isn’t this the first time an attempt succeeded?” I tried to play off my nervous state in a smooth manner. I don’t really think I achieved it, though.

            “I believe so; this person definitely knows their way around and didn’t leave anything messy, unlike any other attempts made,” Sam nodded in agreement while looking in a small, black notebook.

            “So, the Sheriff here is kind enough to let us work on the case with one of her ‘best,’ as she has said herself,” Dean smiled briefly and I could tell that he was observing me. I didn’t entirely like the way he was watching me suspiciously.

            “All right, boys! Have at it. Let me know if there’s anything you need. Any questions before I leave?”

            “Yes, actually. Why are there two sheriffs in town?” Dean asked.

            “Oh, it’s a funny story, actually. Sheriff Singer, though we call him that, is sort of in-training? From another county, you know.” She patted me and Sam on the shoulders and walked off.

            “So, let’s have at it, then,” Sam smiled.

 

**xxx**

 

            It was around midnight and I was relaxing on my armchair with some scotch in my hand when I heard my phone ring on the table next to me.

            “’Ello, Castiel. Disappeared today, eh? Everything go well at the station?” I took a sip from my cup. There wasn’t an answer for a while, so I checked to make sure I was still connected to the call. “Cas?”

            “Yes, sorry; I am here. I am just exhausted right now. I just got out of…”

            “Hmm? Sorry, dear, I can’t hear what you said. Out of what?”

            “Um, the station…” His voice seemed reluctant, which I found strange for him, since he’d been getting more comfortable talking to me.

            “Was it about the bone?”

            “Yeah—uh, Sheriff Mills just wanted me to work around the station while she and a few others worked on the case…”

            “Really? That was it? So much better than I expected, honestly,” I smiled to myself at the sound of the news.

            I heard Cassie chuckle nervously on the other line. “Yeah,” he said, “Me, too. Uh, look, I’m tired but do you think I could come over so we could possibly start looking in to where Bela is?”

            “You never want to just see me for me, hon; it breaks my heart,” I teased.

            “I, uh, ha,” was all he came out with and then paused for a few moments, presumably waiting for me to say more. “Is—is that okay?” he breathed.

            “Yes, of course it is. The faster we find her the better,” I replied.

 

*******

Once he finally arrived and walked in, I could already sense something different about him. He seemed on edge and very jumpy, but he wasn’t explaining why. I would ask him if he was sure that he was all right, and he would reply that he was still anxious about the other night and afraid that he would get caught. Fair enough. The poor boy had gone through a lot lately.

            “How do we track her now?” he asked after I gave him a glass of water to calm his nerves.

            “Honestly, I believe your hacking skills can help us,” I winked at him.

            “What—no, I thought we were done with that!” I could sense the distress in the poor baby’s voice.

            “You’re using it for good now; not bad. Why don’t you calm down a little bit?” I grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him to sit down. “Goodness, your nervousness is getting to me. Stop pacing; you’re driving me insane, sweetheart.” I rubbed my forehead and sighed. “I don’t know if you’ll be able to work under these conditions—”

            “N-no, I’m… fine. I don’t want to wait,” he said as he put down his glass on the coffee table.

            “All I was going to say was that you can use your skills to look into security cameras around the area, past footage, et cetera. Understand? In addition to that, we will be talking to many different people. I have a few people I can ‘trust’ as long as I have something they want.” I leaned back on the couch and crossed my arms across my chest while eyeing him.

            He was still wearing his cop uniform and I must say that it fit him well. He noticed me looking at him and chuckled, “I look stupid in this, don’t I?” He then took off his hat and threw it at me playfully. “By the way,” he continued speaking, “Thanks for letting me use your car. I wasn’t expecting that.”

            “It was nothing. I realized you didn’t have a way to get home and the bus is no where in your league—so I decided leaving you with the car for the day would be best,” I patted him on the back and felt tempted to keep my hand there, but I soon laughed at myself and mentally said _no, he already has enough freaking him out now._

            Castiel was still in thought and then finally said, “Oh, can you drop me off at my place? I don’t want to keep your car from you any longer…” He twiddled his thumbs and didn’t make eye contact. I still felt like something was wrong that he wasn’t telling me.

            Before I could ask him again, his phone rang and he jumped almost ten feet in the air. He then quickly grasped his phone and answered it almost out of breath.

            “Yes, hello? Oh, yeah, hey there, Dean. Isn’t this a bit late for a phone call?” he glanced over at me nervously; I could tell he wanted the call to end. I had no clue why, though. Probably just wanted to spend time with me—ha, I’m joking, lovelies (partially). “I’m kind of busy right now; can you—can you call back tomorrow morning? Yeah, yeah. That’s ok, I understand. Thanks. Okay. Bye.” He hung up and put the phone down next to him fretfully.

            “A friend?” I asked, curious.

            “Yeah, um, I guess so. Not sure why he was calling so late, heh,” he scratched the back of his neck.

            “Okay, Cas, can I be frank with you?” I turned to face him and put my hands down on my knees.

            He faced me back and cocked his head to the side, a bit confused; “Yes, of course.”

            “I think you should relax for tonight. Do something fun, or maybe just go to sleep. We can start working on the chase tomorrow—we won’t be able to talk to people until then, anyway. What do you say, dearie?”

            “What do you mean by having fun, exactly?” he asked.

            “I don’t know—what do you normally do?”

No response. It honestly seemed like this man never had fun in his life nor did he know the meaning of the word.

            “All right, how about we put in a movie and you can continue to be boring but the two of us can still have fun? Tomorrow will be our big day.”

 

**xxx**

 

            “What happened?”

            “He didn’t seem to want to talk. He was ‘busy’ with whatever he was doing,” Dean closed the motel door behind him and dropped on his back on the other bed. “I figured I’d be nice and apologize for being a bit… cold. I just got a really strange vibe at first—but he’s a cool guy. He took the compliment like a pro and hung up as soon as he could.”

            “Is it just me or are you upset about this?”

            “What??” he scoffed. “No, of course not. I was just trying to be friendly. Was hoping for some in return.”

            I laughed for a few seconds, which caused Dean to give me a bitchface. It was completely worth it, to be honest. “Dean, the poor guy was trying to be as nice as possible to the two of us during the whole entire day.”

            “Whatever,” was his reply, “But, anyway, do you think that all those interrogations really brought us anywhere?”

            “Well they didn’t exactly take us away from our original theory, so I take that as bringing us somewhere. There are a few people who may fit the description of the _Thief of Hell_. Get this: there is a Bela Talbot who is being accused for stealing a precious jewelry but she took off and no one knows where she is, and there was a man apparently wrongly arrested for it. His name is Crowley.”

            “Sounds like we should look into them more. Tomorrow,” he replied, half asleep.

            “Yeah, okay, we’ll do that tomorrow,” I shook my head with a soft laugh and closed my laptop. I figured that sleep would probably be a good thing to do—the next day would be a big day.


	8. Secrets, Secrets, and More Secrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember: "xxx" = POV shift ; "***" = time skip

            It was the next morning and I awoke from the same couch again. This time, though, I noticed the TV was on and Crowley was asleep on the armchair next to the couch. He put in a few movies to show me since I’ve apparently missed out on a lot of wonderful things, and I guessed we fell asleep in the middle of Queen of the Damned (it was on the startup menu), though Crowley deemed it one of his favorite. I guess we just got too tired.

            I looked over at my watch that was resting on the coffee table to check the time. Eight-thirty A.M. I wasn’t sure when exactly Crowley decided we were to start investigating more intensely, but decided to wait for him to wake by himself. While I waited, I found Growley on his doggy bed and petted him for a while.

            Not too long later, Crowley’s phone started to vibrate from the end table next to the armchair. I waited a few seconds to see if Crowley woke up, but after noticing him still lost in sleep, I walked over and tapped him on the shoulder. No use. I looked over at his phone and the name _Meg_ was plastered on the screen. The phone stopped ringing for a few seconds and then started again. _Seems important_ , I thought to myself as I tried to figure out another way to wake up Crowley.

            “Crowley,” I spoke softly, not sure if loud sounds would startle him—and then I realized, _Wait. Why am I worrying about that?_ I then spoke his name a bit louder and shook him by the shoulders.

            His eyelids fluttered open and he stared at me, a bit confused. “Why, Cas, this is so sudden—” but his joke was interrupted when I let go of him and he saw me point to the phone with my eyes. “Oh?” he mused as he picked up the phone. “Megan, sweetie. Anything wrong?’

            _“Meg, sweetie, to you,”_ I heard the voice on the other line speak sarcastically, but in a happy tone.

            “I find Megan suits you,” Crowley smiled.

            _“Save it for later, you romantic. So, let’s cut to the chase, shall we? Word on the street is you are searching for Bela. I thought sicking the hounds on her was all you wanted and needed. Starting to play dangerous, hmm?”_

            “What’s in it for you to know?” he seemed to not be amused with where the conversation was going. He also signaled for me to sit down while he put the phone on speaker—also signaling with his free finger over his lips for me to keep quiet.

            _“I may or may not want to help. You’re not the only one Bela screwed over, gorgeous.”_

            “You sure about that? Siding with me would probably bring you some trouble. I’m sure Bela is going to send some problems my way sooner or later.”

            _“Yeah, well, no one said a thief’s life is easy. I think I have good information to help you, too. What comes to me is my problem—nobody else’s. You just worry your pretty head over whether you want this information or not, and information to come.”_

            “It depends on the information,” Crowley kept his cool and almost seemed uninterested in getting a lead from someone other than himself. I leaned my elbows on my knees and my chin on my hands, awaiting Meg’s reply.

            Meg cackled and I could sense a grin plastered on her face. _“You don’t even know. Apparently, I may or may not know that Bela isn’t entirely freelancing it all off.”_

            “What, that woman would be _working_ for someone? Isn’t that exactly what she said she hated most?” Crowley’s eyebrows raised in interest; “How would you may or may not know this?”

            _“I have my ways. And this isn’t the only juicy information I have, either. But, I will only give the rest to you if you accept me into your little_ team _with that Mr. Clarence guy, who—I’m assuming—is with you right now.”_ Her voice was confident.

            I looked over at Crowley, surprised at her guess, but he waved his hand, which told me to ignore her remark.

            “All right, you lovely snitch, you’re in. I’ll have you know, though, that if you mess up _anything_ —and I mean anything—you are going to wish you hadn’t called. You understand?”

            _“Of course; you can count on me, chief. Want to set up a nice date between me, you and your handsome friend?”_ Another laugh emanated from the phone.

            “How about right now?”

            _“You make me all warm and fuzzy inside, wanting to see me right away,”_ Meg joked smoothly. _“Where at?”_

“Seeing as I just woke up with this call, why don’t we relax at a café for some coffee?” Crowley then gave her the address and they both bid adieu.

            “We’re not meeting up at the usual place?” I asked as I reached over to grab my shoes.

            “I don’t want any nosey good-for-nothings eavesdropping. Of course we’ll need to be careful at a public place, but I feel that is a lot safer,” he patted me on the back and walked off into his room, probably to change into another outfit. I sighed as I looked down and realized I was still in my cop uniform.

            “Crowley!” I shouted from across the room, “We need to go to my place—I’m still in my uniform,” I laughed nervously and waited for his reply.

            “Of course. Remember, Meg believes you are a thief. Can’t blow that cover now,” he replied as he walked back out, brushing his shoulders.

“All right. I’m good. Ready?”

 

**xxx**

 

            “Dean. Dean! Hey, hey, hey!”

            A bright light flooded the room and interrupted the nice darkness that was surrounding my eyelids. I groaned and sat up, rubbing my eyes. “Time to wake up already?” The motel door then closed.

            “Yep. I got us some coffee and breakfast—pie for you. Here.”

            “Aw, Sammy, you know just how to wake up a man,” I laughed as I caught the pie that my baby brother threw at me after rolling his eyes. “Apple pie, mmm.”

            “C’mon, it’ll be questioning time soon. I need the two of us to be as awake as ever if we want to catch this guy,” he sat down on his bed and took out a bagel for himself from the bag. “By the way, you should try calling Castiel again,” he suggested.

            “Hm. I will. After I am finished with this bee-you-ti-ful pie,” I quickly opened the packaged and hungrily dug into the beauty.

            After quickly devouring our meals, I tried calling Castiel. “Any luck?” Sammy asked after I dropped my phone on the bed and sighed.

            “Nope. Nada. Didn’t pick up or nothing. Probably still sleeping, I guess? I don’t think he said he was working today, unless he got called in like yesterday?” I thought aloud.

            “Worth a try to find him at the station. Good way to start asking about Crowley and Bela, even if he’s not there,” he shrugged and stood up, readying himself to start leaving.

            “I suppose so,” I shrugged as well and put my phone in my pocket. “I also left a voicemail asking for him to call back. The sheriff assigned him on this case, so I think we should keep him updated on what we do and find, too.”

            “Sounds fair. Ready to go?”

            “Yep. We’re gonna find this sonuvabitch of a thief, I swear to god or my name isn’t Dean Winchester.”

 

*******

 

            To our not-surprise, Officer Castiel was nowhere to be found at the station. We didn’t really find any extra information that we didn’t already know, so we were still practically at ground zero.

            “So, you want to see if we can get ahold of Castiel now that it is a few hours later?” Sammy asked me as we walked out of the station.

            “Yeah, sure,” I squinted away from the sun and pulled out my phone, dialing his number again. It rang a few times, and finally there was a voice on the other line.

            “Hello?”

            “Hey, Castiel. Finally decided to wake up from your beauty sleep?” I scratched the tip of my nose as I spoke.

            “Oh, sorry, I was sleeping and then took—”

            “It’s okay, no need for any excuses,” I forced out a chuckle and put my free hand in my pocket. “Anyway,” I continued, “Are you, uh, busy right now?”

            “…Why?”

            I looked over at Sam, who tilted his head to the side in question. I put up my index finger, telling him to wait.

            “Sam and I just got out of the Police Department and got squat. We figured you might have gotten some information when you were going solo last night? We know that there are two strong suspects of the case—a Bela and a Crowley. You were the cop that arrested Crowley?”

            “Uh, hold on,” he replied with a bunch of rustling and an “excuse me, I need to take this call for a second.” I could also hear multiple voices in the background. I raised my eyebrows and balanced on my heels for a second while I waited for him to come back to the phone.

            “Sorry, I can speak now—”

            “You’re with some friends or something?”

            “I… Guess you could say that,” he spoke quickly.

            “Anyway—As I was saying! You were the cop who arrested Crowley, yeah?” I then moved my head to signal Sam that we should continue walking.

            “Yes, I was. He was wrongly accused and so we let him go. No proof against him—he said he was just trying to find the culprit and so we told him that he should be more careful next time and confide in the police more than anything,” he replied a bit uneasily.

            “And about Bela?”

            “We were tipped off about her being a prime suspect. We looked into her more and saw that she had multiple crimes and multiple identities. Practically, everything fit nicely with her name—uh, _names_.”

            I had the volume on my phone up as much as possible so Sammy could listen in on the conversation, and he seemed interested to say the least.

            “Okay, so… She’s probably our guy—er, girl?”

            “Maybe, maybe not. The police is chasing her after the jewelry predicament; it doesn’t mean she’s behind the theft at the museum.”

            “But it’s incredibly possible?” Sammy interjected.

            “Oh—hello, Sam. And yes, it’s very possible. But from what you two told me yesterday, you’re searching for the _Thief of Hell_ and figure he—or she—is behind the disappearance of the ancient bone? You’d then assume that this person would be Bela,” he added.

            “Or that Crowley that you found in the middle of those thieves. Can’t cross him off the list,” I made sure to add myself.

            “Ah—yes, uh, I assume so. But if you look at his records, there is nothing against the law, whereas Bela—”

            I interrupted him, “Yeah, we get that. Can’t rule him out, though. So, can you meet up with us for some researching?” There was silence for a while.

            “Later today; is that okay? I’m in the middle of something important right now—not that this isn’t important either, but…” His voice trailed off.

            I rubbed my forehead in a bit of frustration, but Sam put a hand on my shoulder, which told me to agree with it.

            “We didn’t arrange a meeting today—let him finish with his plans. It would be rude for him to leave like this,” he whispered to me. Ah, Sammy—the sympathetic and caring angel on my shoulder that tells me not to be too harsh or just a dick in general.

            “Okay, what time is good for you?” I tried to speak in a nicer tone.

            “At four in the afternoon?” I could sense some relief in his voice.

            I nodded even though he wouldn’t be able to see it, as well as smiled, “Yeah, that could work. Meet up at the station, then. See you there,” and with that, I hung up before he could say bye.

            “Dean, you gotta realize that you can’t treat people like this and expect them to roll it off their shoulders like I do,” Sammy shook his head with a smile on his face.

            “What are you talking about? Everyone loves me. I’m adorable,” I pursed my lips while turning towards my gigantore of a little brother, pretending to lean forward and kiss him on the cheek.

            “Get your _adorable_ face away from me. Gross,” he pushed me away and laughed like the cute dork he is. Sometimes I forget that the two of us are tough and stern bounty hunters.

 

**xxx**

 

            “Who is he talking to?” Meg asked, curiosity gleaming in her eyes as she watched Cassie rather suspiciously. I looked behind me to get a look myself, and he seemed to be a bit nervous for some reason.

            We were at the outer-part of the café when Castiel’s phone went off and he scampered off like a frightened sheep.

            “I have no idea, love,” I retorted as I felt some curiosity creep up on me, too.

            “Your friend seems entirely reserved and he keeps to himself a lot,” Meg added while leaning her cheek on her left hand and played with the straw of her drink absently.

            “Yes, a bit,” I said as I continued watching him. “I was able to get passed some of that, though. You know, with my charm and skill.” I then winked at her and turned back to face her once Cas started waltzing back from his call.

            “Sorry, it was from the station,” Cassie murmured softly to only me as he sat back down in his seat.

            “Hey, secrets? Really?” Meg crossed her arms and leaned back in her seat.

            “Oh, I apologize; I didn’t mean to… I am just used to being… discreet,” he tried to cover it up and got a sassy “mmm” from Meg in response. “I was just saying that I am needed to help out my family—uh, my nephew needs a babysitter,” was the best excuse that he could come up with, and I must admit that it was rather cute.

            “Taking care of your family; how sweet.” I wasn’t sure if Meg was impressed or sarcastic. Heh, probably the former, though, since she seemed to fancy Cassie.

            Cas smiled awkwardly and I could tell he was trying to figure out a way to change the subject. Fortunately, me being his savior, I already knew how to do so.

            I cleared my throat to break the silence. “So, tell us about the extra information you have. And, I think it would be wise to let us know your sources.” I could see that Meg didn’t seem too keen on my request.

            “What, you don’t believe me or something? What does a girl have to do to prove herself, Crowley?” She leaned forward and kept her eyes fixed on me, a smirk slowly appearing. She looked at her hands for a few seconds while adding: “Be assured that I don’t get information from just anyone. Don’t worry, I’m not trying to screw you two over. You’re the nicer bunch of the assholes. No offense.” She turned to Cas and placed a hand on his shoulder with a laugh.

            Castiel chuckled slightly, but was far more bewildered than anything. “I think we can believe her, Crowley,” he tried to say smoothly but I could tell he was still nervous. Poor, adorable lad.

            I sighed slightly, being a bit persuaded by Cas and his jumpiness. “All right. For now. If you give us any reason to doubt you, though—”

            “You’ll kick me out, yeah, I get ya, Crowley,” she rolled her eyes, “How about we talk some business now, instead of this chit-chat? Shall we?”


	9. Double Agent - Twice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember: "xxx" = POV shift ; "***" time skip

            “So, as I was saying before: Bela is apparently working for someone, but not just anybody. This guy is a mob boss, and many call him Lucifer some reason or another,” Meg scoffed, “His real name is probably Nick or something. Anyway, this guy apparently means business and has a bunch of little, obedient thieves working for him; Bela included.”

            “You mean to tell me there are many people we deal with who are working for this man?” I felt my interest increase even more.

            “Yeah. I have no clue how many there are—they don’t seem to actually interact with anyone but Lucifer himself,” Meg added.

            Castiel crossed his arms in front of him on the table and leaned forward. “If you know all of this information, do you know exactly where they are located?” he asked. This caused Meg to look a bit frantic, which is not her usual poise.

            “We don’t even know if Bela would be staying there or not,” she frowned.

            “Do you know where the place is or not?” I asked, pushing Cassie’s question. I could see that Meg was biting the inside of her cheek, her eyes trailing away from the both of us, and her fingers strumming the table quickly. She then turned back to us and leaned forward. “And if I did know? What would you do? Just waltz into there? You gotta remember that he’s not just a thief—he’s a _mob boss_ , for Pete’s sake,” she smiled weakly, “I’m pretty sure that you two wouldn’t be able to take him on.”

            “You wouldn’t go with us?” Castiel asked. Ah, always asking the right questions—that’s my boy.

            “I said I was in on giving you information—I never said my hands would get dirty,” she raised her hands in front of her, her voice quivering a bit as she spoke.

            “Is there something you’re not telling us? Why wouldn’t you go?” Cas jumped in again—it seemed that he did his police job better when he wasn’t actually being a policeman.

            “I have my own, personal reasons,” Meg spoke slowly as she turned to look at me as if to ask what Cas was doing. I smiled at her and crossed my arms across my chest. None of us spoke for a while; it was mostly staring, and Meg didn’t feel too inclined to speak until the silence was overbearing:

            “Okay, okay! You want to know why? Fine, I’ll tell you why! But you’re not allowed to tell anyone, otherwise I’ll slit your throats,” she paused and when neither of us said anything, she sighed deeply and looked down while she spoke, “I became a part of the crew, so to speak.”

            “Jackpot! You’re a part of that bloody organization? Lead us right to—” I started to speak, but Meg slapped the table to interrupt me.

            “I wasn’t done talking,” she scoffed, most likely offended. “Anyway, I left a while ago. I wasn’t on good terms with anyone there thanks to Bela. Ironically enough, she’s the reason why I joined. She came to me and helped me up when I wasn’t doing too well, and tried to make me feel guilty when I didn’t want to help her. I met Lucifer through her, and he was basically like a father to me… That is, until Bela decided she would scheme to make me seem untrustworthy. Long story short, she made it seem like I did something and, in return, Lucifer got angry at me and I chose to leave. I have no clue if they’re still located in the same place. Probably moved to a new location once I left so I wouldn’t find them again,” she finished with a sigh.

            Well, this new piece of information was not as great as I hoped. “But, you’re saying that Bela is most likely hiding under the wings of this Lucifer?” I asked, twiddling my thumbs mindlessly.

            “I don’t see where else she’d run to, honestly,” Meg replied and then took a sip from her drink. “She’s an obedient, little _cockroach_ ,” she uttered the last part with disgust.

            Cas wasn’t really talking—he seemed to be thinking to himself, putting pieces together. Meg turned to him, also noticing his silence. “Any thoughts you’d like to share with the class?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

            “If you take us to where you used to reside at, there may be some clues left as to where they ran off to, or at least the general idea,” Cassie finally let out after a few seconds.

            “I’m pretty sure they cleared off everything. This organization has been held together for years on end—I don’t think they’d overlook something like that,” Meg retorted with a sneer.

            “I’m not so sure about that, love,” I interjected, “See, Cassie here is a specialist in this type of thing.” I winked at Cas, who looked at me with a warning expression on his face. _Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me, baby,_ I wanted to say, but that wouldn’t be a very good idea—so, instead, I just gave him a reassuring look.

            “A specialist, hm?” Meg grinned devilishly, “What else are you a specialist at, pretty boy?”

            “I—I just know how to observe,” Castiel replied, feeling a bit on the spot. He then looked at his watch; “We just can’t do it after four.”

            “We should have time to do it now,” I observed, seeing it was only eleven in the morning, “Don’t worry, darling, we’ll be finished before four.”

            “All right, let’s hop to it, then—” Meg started, but I interrupted her before she could jump off and away from the table.

            “Ah, ah, ah, sweetie; don’t forget to pay your bill,” I wagged my finger and smiled at her, noticing she was trying to steal her way from paying.

            She smiled sarcastically and slumped back down to the table while I flagged down the waiter for the bills. “I do, though, appreciate your enthusiasm for this case,” I added.

            Leaning forward (she seemed to do that a lot for some reason), Meg put a hand on mine and replied: “As much as you’re not too much of a pain in the ass, this isn’t to help you. It’s for my own, selfish needs, yeah?”

            “I’m pretty sure that’s why we’re all here, honey,” I clicked my tongue with a smile and then trailed my eyes over to Cas. He didn’t understand, but Meg caught on right away.

            “Right. Well, let’s get over with paying so we can stop being so _sentimental_ ,” Meg laughed half-heartedly.

 

*******

I was the one who drove us over to the old location because Meg didn’t want her car being seen anywhere close to that area. She sat in the passenger seat and Cas in the back—I almost protested, but I wanted to make sure she was happy and wouldn’t leave this investigation before we were done.

            It took a while, turning here and turning there every minute—I have to say, dearies, it was a well-hidden spot. I was getting bored in the car and nothing good was on the radio, so we all drove in silence except for the occasional directions from Meg.

            Once we reached the area, Meg turned to look at Cas behind her seat and asked, “So, you think you can find any type of information that leads us to them?”

            “I’ll see what I can do,” Cas replied in a cute, shy tone.

            “Oh, hush. I’m sure you’ll get us some leads,” I turned in my seat as well. He looked up at me and gave me a small smile of embarrassment. Meg looked over at me and rolled her eyes, quickly jumping out of the car so we would follow suit.

            “So… You sure this is the place, hon?” I asked while observing the area. It was in a clearing of trees, the ground made of gravel and dirt, presumably a place for many trees and grass years and years ago. Up ahead was a very old building—it looked like an abandoned factory of some sort. It was definitely run-down and not a pretty one at that.

            “Yep, this is it. And it doesn’t look like anyone is here. There’s usually one or two people somewhere around the front of the building or on the ceiling,” she noted while she scoped the area.

            Cas closed the door behind him and squinted while he watched the place in front of us. He then looked down at the ground. “How long ago did you leave the… organization?” Cassie asked, looking back up to Meg.

            “Hmm, probably one year ago,” she replied after thinking for a few moments.

            “I see some footprints and tire marks but most of them are almost faded. I would guess that they left around that time, too. If we find something here, who knows if it’ll lead us to the place they’d be staying at now,” he explained.

            “Well, they like to stay in one spot for as long as possible… And, well… People are usually killed off if they go against the rules. I was an exception, I suppose. I ran, but Lucifer never sent anyone after me. I’m supposing he still regarded me as a daughter and felt that I wouldn’t betray him—” She stopped speaking right away, her eyes widening. “Wait, if I go through with this plan to get rid of Bela, the police will definitely find Lucifer and they’ll all know it was me,” she added, panic showing on her face.

            “We can arrange for your name to stay away from all this,” I suggested, but it didn’t really console her. She looked at me and ran her hand through her hair.

            “I’m pretty sure they’d figure out it was me. No one else would know but me.”

            “The police could always be the ones who ended up here because of suspicious activity,” Cas suggested. Attaboy.

            “How can you be sure that they’d go with that type of information?” Meg asked, raising an eyebrow.

            I jumped into the conversation, “I’m the one with connections to the police. I’m the one telling them everything. If I mention my suspicions and make up a story, they’ll look into the place.” I smiled.

            “Well, I guess so…” Meg sighed, looking back over at the building. “All right,” she said, “Let’s go in before I regret coming here.”

 

**xxx**

 

            We were at the station at around three-fifty and Dean was getting on my nerves. He kept on pacing, even though Officer Castiel still had ten minutes until he had to be there. “Hey, can you sit down or something?”

            “I just really want to find out who the hell this _Thief of Hell_ is. Is it too much to ask??? We’ve been after him for a while now and they’ve been able to stay one step ahead of us each time, man,” he complained as he dropped into a random chair against the wall.

            “I know, Dean; we just have to be patient. Trying to figure things out with a cluttered mind makes things harder. Castiel will be here in minutes and then we’ll be able to discuss everything that you wanna talk about, okay?” I shook my head but couldn’t help but smile. He was always impatient and wanting to jump right into things; he was like a little kid.

            We both waited silently for minutes until we heard the door open. “Hello, sorry I’m a bit late,” the familiar voice called out to us as he entered.

            “You’re only five minutes late, don’t worry,” I threw in before Dean would unreasonably chew him off for the time.

            “Not in your uniform? Any reason why?” Dean asked. I rolled my eyes.

            “I—I didn’t realize I needed to do that. I’m not on duty right now. And Sheriff Mills knows exactly who I am, so…” he squinted at Dean, trying to figure out why he was finding flaws that weren’t flaws.

            “Nah, that’s fine; I was just wondering. You seemed like the type of guy who would always wear your uniform for things like this,” he shrugged and then stood up. I rolled my eyes again, wishing that Dean would make himself a lot more pleasant than the dick he pretends to be. Seems like it’s a mechanism for keeping people away, because he doesn’t do too well with relationships. Well, neither do I—we can only really rely on each other.

            “Okay, so, you guys wanted to touch bases on the whole Bela situation?”

            “The whole _Thief of Hell_ situation,” Dean corrected him.

            “Actually, we’re here for the robbery of the museum which may or may not be the _Thief of Hell_ ,” I corrected Dean who shot me an annoyed look.

            Officer Castiel nodded and walked over to his desk and leaned back, Dean and me sitting at the seats right in front of the desk.

            “So, when you were solo-ing last night in research, did you come up with anything? Sammy and I haven’t been doing too well,” Dean spoke first.

            “I—Maybe,” the officer spoke to us, seeming a bit hesitant.

            “Really? That would be helpful if you did,” I replied.

            “Well, I don’t know if it’s reliable or not… but it’s interesting, for sure,” he scratched the side of his face and looked up at us, unsure if he should continue.

            “Tell us; if it’s irrelevant or not real info, it’s still something to go by. What is it?” I tried convincing him to continue. He seemed hesitant, but he obliged after a few seconds of silence.

            “Apparently Bela doesn’t freelance—she works for someone, it seems. And she seems to be working for this guy who is known as _Lucifer_. I got the location for the old place they stayed at but didn’t find anything that could lead us anywhere else for now,” he let out. I looked over at Dean, raising my eyebrows. Dean’s face was twisted in thought—we didn’t think that there could be more than one person behind all this.

            “Well, I guess that could make sense,” Dean let out.

            “I… Where did you get that information from, Castiel?” I asked, wondering how he came across this type of information basically overnight.

            He sighed before speaking, “That person didn’t want their identity given out unless very necessary. I also felt it would be better to keep it anonymous for now, since said person said they weren’t one-hundred percent sure.”

            “All right. Fair enough,” I replied, “Any other information you got on the museum steal?”

            “Well,” he started, “It only seems natural that Bela stole it and ran off—she’s the only lead we have.” He seemed rather confused.

            “Don’t forget we have Mr. Crowley,” Dean added. Officer Castiel looked off to the side and sighed.

            “We have no information on him. He was wrongfully accused of theft and we let him go. He had nothing against him. His records are completely clean,” Castiel replied.

            “Yeah, well, I don’t believe that. He’s one of our suspects for the _Thief of Hell_. You’re the one who found him, yeah?” Dean continued.

            Castiel nodded slowly, unsure of what was to come next. Dean smiled and looked at me. I raised an eyebrow. “Would you say that you could go and talk to him at any time as a friendly cop or whatever?” he asked.

            “I… Yes, I suppose… so…?” Castiel’s eyes squinted and his brow furrowed at Dean’s words. I, too, furrowed my brow as I looked over at Dean and tried to understand where he was getting at.

            “Well, that means you can spy on him for us, right? You get info on him for us while we research Bela,” my brother smiled triumphantly at his genius idea. I did have to admit, though; it was a very good idea. I looked over at Castiel and tapped the desk in front of me.

            “You know, that’s not a bad idea,” I finally let my voice be heard. Castiel looked over at me and then my brother with wide eyes, probably not wanting to spy on someone when we only had a small hunch on him.

            “You—you want me to befriend him to _spy_ on him?” he shifted in his seat uncomfortably. “I-I don’t know how I feel about that… I don’t know if I’m cut out to do something like that—“

            Dean interrupted him, “Dude, calm down. It’s fine. I’m sure you’ll do a great job.” He smiled and reached forward, patting Castiel on the hand with a wink. “Good talk. Now, if you don’t have any extra information, I think we should get going—and you can start making friends with Mr. Crowley.”


	10. Change

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember: "xxx" = POV shift ; "***" time skip

            It was a frustrating day for me—from not finding any leads at the old base to Dean and Sam assigning me a mission to spy on Crowley. I didn’t know why I was so stressed out with the fact that I’d be giving the duo information on an _actual_ thief who deserved to be in prison. I reasoned that it was because I helped Crowley with the museum steal, meaning that if Crowley got caught, I’d get caught, too, and my whole world would go upside down—but I wasn’t too sure about that.

            I never hated Crowley, even at the beginning when I realized he sort of screwed me over. He was genuinely a nice person to me… Just, well, doing things against the law. He sometimes said strange things and gave me the weirdest nicknames, but I don’t know; he wasn’t too bad. And those thoughts were the ones that scared me the most; not to mention that I also made acquaintances with yet another thief.

            By the time I got home from the small meeting, I was a nervous wreck. Crowley had, of course, called me to see how things went, and I couldn’t believe that I felt bad for lying to him about me given the job to spy on him. I realized that I couldn’t bring anything to light that involved me, though, so I figured I probably wouldn’t have much to report back to Sam and Dean. Feeling relief from that fact made me all the more nervous, though. I hated going through gray areas, because the law is mostly black-and-white.

            All of my purposes were jumbled, and I wasn’t entirely sure what I was after. Was I after Bela? Was I trying to get Crowley arrested? Why would I go over to his place just so he can chit-chat and show me his most favorite movies? It was quite frustrating, I have to say, and being home didn’t help me calm down at all.

            Before I knew it, two weeks had passed by with nothing eventful happening: Crowley, Meg and I hadn’t found any leads after visiting the place multiple times, work was the usual, and Dean and Sam went about their merry way searching for more clues on the museum theft, even though Dean was more concerned with Crowley.

            “So, have you been able to get any information from Crowley?” he asked me one day when I was on the job in the office.

            “I already told you last night that I have not,” I replied with a sigh as I stopped focusing on my computer and faced him.

            “I don’t know, you got some information overnight a few weeks ago; I was just checking just in case,” he replied with a bit of a sarcastic smile. I rolled my eyes, already used to the way Dean talked to me. Thankfully his brother was a lot nicer and kept Dean in line for the most part.

            “Hey, that’s fine. I guess that’s good news, anyway, right? No news for two weeks may be telling us that Bela is our man—er, woman,” Sam interjected. I nodded right away, wanting them to stop poking into Crowley’s business so much.

            “That’s what I’ve been saying,” I replied, “I think we’re facing in the wrong direction.” I took off my cap and placed it on my desk, running a hand through my hair. Dean sighed in response, but he seemed to lean more towards agreeing with me. I gave a small sigh and smiled at the two of them.

            “All right, well. I think it’s been too much work and no fun. Whaddaya say we go do something?” Dean asked Sam but then looked at me. “You, too. You work too much. You’re going to get gray hairs before you turn thirty-five,” he added with a wink.

            “I—I’m still here on a shift for…” I paused and looked at my watch, “Two more hours.”

            “No worries! We can go get some grub then. There’s a diner around here that I’ve been itching to try out. Looks like they have amazing burgers. We can then find something non-work-related to do. How ‘bout it?” he said as he put his hands in his pockets.

            I was genuinely surprised that he was inviting me to do something with them—it did make me nervous, though. It was already hard enough working with them, so I could only imagine how being casual would be. Not wanting to be rude, and thinking that maybe this would get me on Dean’s good side, I agreed.

            “Cool,” Sam smiled and put a hand on Dean’s shoulder, “Now, let’s not bother him any longer. He’s still at work. C’mon, Dean.” He dragged Dean away before anything else could be said. I waved at them, glad that I could bask in my nervous state alone.

 

*******

            Once I was done with my shift, I went home and decided to take a quick shower to calm my nerves before leaving. I wanted to slap myself for feeling so nervous, but I honestly hadn’t gone out to be social with anyone else other than Crowley and sometimes Meg—but _always_ with Crowley. The Winchesters were in with the law, and I had to make sure that my casual ways with the two thieves would not pollute anything in my conversations with Sam and Dean.

            After getting out of the shower and looking over my clothes in the closet, my phone started to ring. I ran over to the phone—which I left lying on the bed—grunting as I held the towel around my waist. Crowley’s name was lit up on the screen, causing me to hold my breath for a second. Forcefully letting out a few breaths, I picked up the phone and tried to answer it as casually as possible—though that is quite impossible for me, even on a good day.

            “Hey, Crowley.”

            “’Ello, love. You off of work?” Crowley’s voice sounded from the other line.

            “Oh—uh, y-yeah. Just got home recently, actually,” I replied, feeling my voice waver. _Damn it_ , I thought to myself, _Keep a grip, Cas!_

            “Just finished taking a nice shower now, I suppose?” How he figured out most of the things he guessed, I have no idea.

            “Yeah, heh,” I let out a small laugh. I was pretty sure that Crowley could tell something was wrong—but he didn’t say anything about it.

            “Lovely. Means you’re ready to take a break from all this cumbersome and unsuccessful searches for Lucifer’s lair and go out somewhere. When will you be ready to takeoff?” I was hoping he wouldn’t ask that. I didn’t want to disappoint him or make him suspicious of anything, but plans were already made, and I couldn’t bail.

            “Oh, um, I already have plans. Not sure for how long,” was all I could say back.

            “Really?” Crowley’s voice sounded surprised. “Since when have you decided to go out and be social?”

            “I haven’t decided to,” I let out another laugh, “The Winchesters invited me to go to a diner and maybe do something later with them. I think they just want to get friendlier with me, which is a good thing… I suppose.”

            “Ah, that sounds… Lovely,” he replied, though I could sense some disappointment in his voice. “That’s all right! Let me know if you have time later on tonight and maybe I can show you more movies that you’ve been deprived from.”

            “Yeah, sure. You can always do something with Meg in the meantime,” I suggested.

            “I’m pretty sure that girl wants nothing to do with us other than using us to find Bela. Besides, she has more of an interest in you than me. Well, anyway! I don’t want to keep you from your plans. Keep me updated, darling. Tata!” And with that, he hung up without letting me say anything else. I sighed and dropped my phone on the bed and went back to my clothes.

            I found it funny how I was actually more inclined to cancel plans with people who are righteous with the law for someone who breaks it all the time for his own needs. I pushed that thought out of the way, though, because I didn’t want to dwell on the subject any longer.

            After putting on a collared shirt and loose jeans, I picked up my phone again and called Dean. It rung a few times before his gruff voice replied: “You ready?”

            “Yeah, you guys can head over—I’ll be there in a bit. Just text me the address,” I said with a yawn distorting the last few words.

            “We’ll go get you. Where do you live?”

            “Oh.” I didn’t know how to react to that. “You don’t have to—“

            “I didn’t ask, did I?” he replied plainly. “Text me your address and we’ll be there in no time. Ciao.” He hung up before I could protest, so I let out a sigh and decided to just give in and text him the address.

*******

            “What? You’ve never seen the Harry Potter movies?” Sam asked in awe as we sat at a table in one of the nicest diners in town. The way he reacted made me wonder how many huge things in pop-culture I’ve missed.

            “No, I’ve not really seen many of the new movies. Don’t go out to the theatre, you know? I don’t really have time to watch them at home, either,” I said, feeling a bit embarrassed by being so out-of-place. Dean—who was surprisingly sitting next to me—shrugged, saying that he never watched the movies nor read the books because it was boring, causing Sam to kick him in the leg.

            Those two brothers are very interesting ones, to put it simply. I could tell that they were entirely complex people—as is everyone, yes, but this felt different. I could sense a wall between us, even while we socialized. It was already hard for me to get out of my shell, so it was even harder when I felt there were so many things in the past that weighed them both down. I didn’t bring any of it up, of course; I didn’t want to be a Downer Debby. I also didn’t want Dean to dislike me when he was finally being a bit nicer.

            The food was pretty good—Dean and I both got a double-bacon burger while Sam settled for a bean burger. I could tell that Dean was eyeing Sam’s sandwich judgingly, and Sam noticed it, too. “Dude,” he said, “You can stop looking at my food with disgust.”

            “Burger is for meat, dude,” Dean scoffed and took a big bite out of his sandwich.

            Sam glared at him, obviously not amused. I continued eating my burger in silence, not jumping into the conversation. A brothers’ argument was only for the brothers; you don’t want to get on the bad side of either of them. Either way, it was nice to know that we were all bonding in some sort of way. It just made me nervous for what Crowley would think when he found out.

 

**xxx**

            I found it a bit odd that Cassie-dear would be invited to _hang out_ with the _Winchesters_ , but I supposed that there wouldn’t be much harm in that. I was a bit surprised that Cas had even accepted it, to be quite frank with you. Either way, I felt like it was a good thing for him (even though I honestly felt a tad bit jealous since Castiel had been coming over almost every time he was off work) to get more comfortable around social events and situations.

            It had been a few hours since I last talked to Castiel—I think it was around 8pm we last talked?—and I had just recently got off the phone with Meg, who said that she wanted to check the area one more time because she remembered a mention of a secret room that no one but Lucifer—and maybe a select few—knew about. She, of course, had no idea of its location, but she said it’d be worth a shot to check it out at least one more time. Maybe we overlooked something, since we weren’t searching for a room-in-hiding. I wanted to have Cas come over so we could talk about it—yes, yes, I know that my main reason was just to see him, okay? There’s no reason to point that out to me, darling—but it was looking like it wouldn’t work out for the rest of the day. Still, I was keeping my phone close to me since I knew that there was a possibility he would leave his socializing soon.

            Sure enough, at around midnight, I heard my phone go off from the side table next to me. I was, yet again, reading a nice book with a cup of hot tea and Growley was resting on my lap—funny, it seemed like that was around the time that Cassie-boy liked calling me. Either way, when I picked up the phone, Cas sounded very tired and, surprisingly, quite intoxicated.

            “’Ey, Crawlee Ahm back home,” he slurred his words horribly. “Dey ‘ready dropped ‘e off ah’ home.”

            “Darling, are you… Drunk?” I inquired with the lift of an eyebrow.

            “Errr Ah think Ah may beee,” Cas returned with a snort.

            “I thought you three were going to do things such as eat at a diner?”

            “’e did buh’ Dan suggested ‘e go to a bar and he said Ah wus too upti—up…” he paused, presumably trying to figure out what word he was trying to say. “ _Tense_ an’ dat Ah needa loosen up so he bawt me lot stuff.” He then hiccupped.

            As much as I found the situation amusing, I couldn’t help but worry about one specific thing: “You didn’t accidentally talk about me or our plans and how you’ve… Well, you know.” I didn’t want Dean and Sam getting too friendly and Castiel being naïve and speaking under the influence of alcohol; that would mess up our entire plan.

            I heard some fumbling and then a loud thump to where I assumed that he dropped the phone, especially since I heard an “oops” coming from him that sounded farther away this time. A few more fumbling and he picked up the phone again, saying, “Naw, didn’ tell ‘em nuffin. Donchu worry, Crawlee.”

            “Good to hear. But now that you are home… Why are you calling me?” I assumed there was a reason, but then again, being drunk can dismiss that assumption. “Is there anything you need?”

            “Didn’ yew say to call when done?” Castiel responded with some difficulty.

            “Well, yes, but that was under that assumption that you would be completely sober. You can’t even drive here,” I replied with a sigh. I wanted to see him, but obviously driving drunk was a horrible idea.

            “Can’ yew get meee?” He sounded a bit upset, though I had no idea why.

            “Of course I can come get you, but I figured you wouldn’t want—” I started, but he interrupted me; he probably didn’t even hear that I was speaking.

            “It’s boring ‘ere. Come pick up pleaaaase.” And with that, he hung up the phone. Astounded and slightly pleased at the same time, I put a bookmark in my book and placed it on the end table. Growley wasn’t too happy that I pushed him off, but I explained to him that it was very important—he didn’t stop complaining, though. Either way, I decided it would be a good idea to be around the drunken man so I make sure he doesn’t run around telling people that he helped rob the museum or something of the sort. I was only glad that he was able to relax more and that he actually drank more than a sip like when I invited him to drink. It _did_ , of course, spark some more jealousy in me about him relaxing around the Winchesters—especially Dean—faster than me, but I pushed that thought out of my mind right away.

 

*******

Once I picked up Mr. Intoxication from his house and brought him over, I had to literally support him while we walked. He put all of his weight on me as we shuffled over to my house, and it was almost impossible! He’s not a heavy man, but it’s a lot harder to handle someone who is drunk than anything. It was even worse in the car. He was in the backseat, rolling around and loudly singing along to the music I was playing while I drove, though I found it fairly amusing. He kept trying to ask me questions that were incomprehensible, and half of his vocabulary was lost and he would spend minutes trying to find a word that had escaped him. He was also telling me a story that would be interrupted by another story and then another, et cetera et cetera, to where I would eventually not know _anything_ that was going on, neither who George was.

            “Here we are,” I let out as I dropped him onto the couch, which he almost rolled off of from losing balance somehow. I laughed, which caused him to laugh even harder and for a long period of time. It took a while before I could even say anything to him—so I decided to sit down and wait—especially since he was trying to talk to Growley and get him to come close; of course my dog knew better than to approach an intoxicated man, so he stayed sitting in the far corner of the room where Cas-darling wouldn’t be able to reach even if he tried really hard.

            “So. What will you be able to do while being drunk? I’m assuming that only watching a movie or something would require no effort from you. I’d hope,” I added after he had calmed down and stayed laying on his back, watching the ceiling.

            “That ceiling is… is shaped weird,” was all he could respond with.

            “All right, I’m presuming that is an agreement to my statement.” I rolled my eyes with a laugh as I stood up to look at the shelf of movies that I owned when Cas reached out and grabbed the bottom of my pant leg.

            “Crawleeeee, look at the ceiling. Why is it so… angle-y…?” he asked, genuinely confused, as he tugged at my pants so I would walk over to him. I decided to humor the poor thing, so I changed my direction and kneeled down on the floor next to him. Cas pointed at the ceiling and squinted as if his life depended on it—it was rather cute.

            “Well, it’s a vaulted ceiling. It’s just what some people like having,” I said softly as I looked up myself. He then stopped pointing and then nodded multiple times before getting completely distracted. I must say that his state was a bit hilarious, but I did miss the Castiel that was reserved and seemed to stop breathing when I got close. This time, he was just looking at me, his eyes still squinting.

            “Whyyy didja lissen to me when Ah told yew to get me…” he asked, though his inflection didn’t change at the end, so I wasn’t entirely sure if he was questioning anything. He then grabbed my sleeve and gripped at it tightly and pulled it close to him, making me look at him quite confused.

            “I didn’t want you to spill our secrets, darling,” I said with a laugh and moved the hand from my free arm to stroke his hair gently. He surprisingly didn’t move away—instead, he frowned and grabbed that arm as well. I raised an eyebrow and watched him closely, trying to figure out what was going on. His eyes were then opened rather wide, the blue of his eyes showing bright as he observed me. Tugging at my arms, he pulled me forward, his eyes completely locked onto mine; I was utterly confused with what he was doing.

            Something then changed in his attitude and Castiel moved back to his drunken state. “Ah wuddent tell any’un even ‘fwas gonn’ die, yew jerk.” he then pushed my arm to the side and huffed.

            “All right, fine. I’ll go find us something to watch and you can just stay there on the couch,” I replied, trying to smile and still a bit puzzled by what happened as I headed over towards the shelves yet again. It was also very strange that when he started pulling me over—I could have sworn that my heart started beating faster. It almost seemed like something was changing, but I honestly had no idea what; I assumed Castiel had no idea either, especially since he was completely drunk.


	11. Now We're Getting Somewhere

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "xxx" POV shift ; "***" time skip

            “Sir, I’ve been keeping an eye out on the outside world… I don’t think you’re going to like what I have to say.”

            “Do tell either way. Not hearing it wouldn’t make the problem go away.”

            “Well, the police is still pursuing Bela, and it seems that there is now a small group of people searching for our new headquarters.”

            I let out a sigh at the news, but I knew that it was only a matter of time until something like this would happen. “Okay. Thank you, Azazel. You may go—unless you have any other pieces of useful information?” I raised an eyebrow.

            “No, sir—Well, maybe… I heard about a short brunette with curly hair who has been poking around our areas. Sort of sounds like Meg, doesn’t it?”

            “Right. Carry on, then,” I replied and waved him off, not replying to the last part of information. He nodded and quickly rushed off to continue whatever it was that he was doing. “Dearest Bela, what problems you have caused for us,” I then said as I turned my body around from the tall seat I was in to face the woman standing at the back of the room.

            “I apologize,” she replied, “I didn’t expect this to happen…” She looked down at the ground.

            “No worries. Just make sure this doesn’t happen again, and it’ll all be okay,” I added with a smile and reached out my arm, signaling for her to come close. She obliged and grabbed my hand.

            “Yes, sir. I understand,” she spoke with a nod and kissed my hand before leaving the room. _Meg, Meg, Meg… Did you decide to show your face again even though you knew the consequences of that?_ I thought, a bit frustrated since I really didn’t want to have to take action. Meg was one of the only people I liked—like a daughter to me—and I didn’t want to end her life, which was why I did not go searching for her when she left. As soon as people would find out, though, I know they would talk and their fear of me would lessen, knowing that there was an exception meaning that there could be more along the way—which is not true, but try explaining that to a bunch of blubbering idiots.

 

**xxx**

            It was a weird night that night—Cas being drunk and all. He was a lot more open about things, and he talked and talked forever about his past once we were done watching Cloud Atlas, which opened a topic for deep conversation. I wasn’t complaining about this openness of his, of course; I was just merely confused by it. I know people say that being drunk is the most truthful someone will ever be, but I never experienced it firsthand.

            After the long conversation we had about family and friends and trust—or, should I say, _during_ —Castiel-dear fell asleep within seconds on the couch. It was impossible to wake him, so I figured I would let him stay on that couch. Again. That couch ended up being his own, really—he slept on that thing more than I or Growley even sat in it. So, after a while I would call it _his_ couch, which would get me a sneer from him. Either way, I found a blanket and laid it on top of him since he didn’t have that dreadful trench coat that he had used as a blanket many times before. He snuggled up to the blanket as soon as it covered his shoulders, which was entirely amusing.

            Anyway, once it was around ten in the morning, I walked out of my bedroom to find him still in the same position he was in when I left him. I didn’t even try waking him because I knew he would wake up to an unpleasant headache—the later he woke up the better. And, well, of course he looked too cute to be woken up. I stretched my arms above my head and let out a small yawn as I sat down by Cassie’s feet. It was quiet and boring, to be honest, but it was nice to relax for a little bit and not have to think about anything. However, not thinking is completely impossible and my mind was already racing at a million miles per hour in such a way that I didn’t even know what I was thinking about. I grunted in annoyance and put a hand to my temple as I looked over at the sleeping angel next to me. Noticing that the blanket rode up a bit at one of his legs, I moved it back so it would cover him entirely again. It was funny how I was more worried about whether Cas had a headache from a hangover or wasn’t completely covered by the blanket than the huge ordeal of finding Bela and getting her behind bars, which would ultimately set me free forever.

            It was rather cumbersome how quickly I had changed directions. Yes, of course Castiel caught my eye and I saw what a beautiful creature he was from the beginning, but it was no more than a superficial appeal. Not that I was admitting to anything more at that time; I still believed that it was just that. I didn’t notice how much I worried about that man not having enough time to relax because he worked too hard—or how much I was personally bothered by him spending some extra time with the Winchesters. I passed those off and over my shoulders as me wanting him to be solely focused on the Mission: Find Bela. Unfortunately, though, I knew that wasn’t the truth at all.

 

*******

            While I was making some brunch—eggs, bacon, et cetera—I heard a groan coming from the couch. “Oh, is Sleeping Beauty finally awake?” I called from the kitchen and got a grunt in response. “How you feeling?” I asked when I got nothing else from him.

            “My head hurts really bad…” Cassie’s gruff and tired voice replied. I peeked through the walkway of the kitchen to the living room and chuckled to myself when I noticed his hair was in all different directions and that he had cute, little bags under his eyes, which he was squinting through, making him all the more adorable. I honestly had the inclination to walk up to him and run my hands through that messy hair, but I held myself, silently scolding about how that is completely unnecessary.

            “Is this your first time having a hangover?” I asked, slightly amused.

            “Hang…over…?” Castiel’s eyes opened as he tried to process what was going on. “No, no; in order to have a hangover, I would have needed to drink a lot last night…” he spoke but then his voice trailed away as he noticed the smile on my face. “What?! I got drunk last night?” he added, his voice rising.

            “Calm down there,” I laughed as I walked over to him, my arms crossing over my chest. “You went with Moose and Squirrel yesterday to have a good time or whatnot, and you called me drunk out of your mind—so I got you and we spent the night here,” I explained as I looked down at him.

            “Who? And… S-spent the night? We didn’t… Uh—”

            “The Winchesters. And, Cassie-dear, I’m flattered, but no. We did not. Don’t worry,” I replied with a smirk and watched him as his face turned red and he looked down at the ground.

            “O-of course. I don’t know why I asked,” he stuttered and refused to make eye contact with me. I laughed softly and walked back into the kitchen to continue cooking, but my mind was thinking a little bit too much for my taste. I wasn’t entirely sure why Cas thought we had done something—whether it was maybe the way I worded my phrase or that there was enough chemistry between us for that to happen—and I couldn’t help blush slightly at the thought of it. _Oh, look at you. Stop blushing, you blubbering idiot! Just get back to cooking and stop thinking too much._

            “You hungry?” I repeated my question from earlier, trying to get things off my mind.

            “Huh—what? Yeah. I was wondering what that smell was,” Castiel replied and I heard him chuckle slightly.

            “So,” I started to change the subject as I continued cooking, “Last night I talked to Meg on the phone and she mentioned that she remembers something about a secret room and wants us to go back to the area to scope it out. I was going to tell you once you came over last night, but… It would have been to no avail since you were out of it.”

            “How can someone forget about a secret room?” Cas asked and I heard him shuffle his way over to the entrance of the kitchen.

            “She was never in it—it was all very hush-hush. She has tried her hardest to keep all of that stuff in the past and forget about it, you know, so she only remembered this important fact now. Either way, I figure we should go once you’re over your hangover,” I replied as I turned off the stove and started putting the food on two separate plates.

            “No, no…” Castiel replied with a slight grunt and a hand to his forehead. “We don’t have to wait. We can go after eating.”

            “Did I say you have a choice in the matter? I want you to be as sharp as possible, capiche?” I then handed him his plate of food. He let out a sigh but took it from me and shuffled back over to the dining room table.

            “All right, fine. But as soon as I feel the slightest better, we’re going,” he added over his shoulder.

            “Okay, Mister Grumpy. I’ll notify Meg right now that we’ll go check it out later today. Now eat your food; we have a long day ahead of us!”


	12. Freshly-Scented Search

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "xxx" = POV shift ; "***" time skip

            I know that I should have remembered the secret lair thing a lot earlier, but a girl’s gotta shove all of her past down and away as far as possible if she wants to continue being a thief. Crowley seemed pretty calm with the news which was a tad confusing but I just thought whatever and shrugged it off. He called me and told me that Clarence was having a bit of an alcoholic dilemma—really surprised me ‘cause I never expected him to even take a sip of alcohol, let alone get drunk—and that we would have to go back to the former hideout to investigate later on that day.

            I figure you all have questions for me about what it was like and what _exactly_ happened and what Bela did to make Lucifer get mad at me, right? Well, that’s not happening, short stuff. If I’m not going to get into detail about it to a thief and Mr. Mysterioso, what makes you think I’d go and tell you? All you need to know is that Bela got me in that adorable little club for thieves, and she got me out of it.

            You just need to know that she’s the reason for basically everyone’s misfortune in these parts and that we all want nothing to do with her. Yeah, we’re thieves. I get it. But listen to me when I say that we don’t hurt people and we don’t _take lives_ like Bela has done. We don’t—we don’t betray our friends, which are always just one or two because you can’t trust more than just that. I never had friends, but seems like Laurel and Hardy over here are the closest I can get to that. I’m rambling now, though, so let’s get back to the story, now shall we?

            It took only a few hours until Crowley called me and stated that Cas was ready to go. I asked _who_ was the one determining that, because I figured that there was no way we would go searching that day.

            “I would say to wait a bit longer, but Cassie-dear isn’t taking no for an answer,” Crowley answered a bit quietly, but I heard Clarence’s voice in the background, shouting “ _I told you I’m feeling one-hundred percent better!”_

            “Better listen to him, Crowley. He’s a cop and a fierce one, at that.”

_Silence._

            “Oh, c’mon Crowley—don’t think that I didn’t notice his observation skills. His mannerisms; everything! Not to mention that I remembered seeing his face before in a cop uniform,” I added when still nothing was said after a few more moments.

            “… _Right…_ All right, so how are we meeting up? Are we taking my car again so you won’t be paranoid about someone lurking about and recognizing your car?—and another thing: why didn’t you get yourself a new car or license plate?” Boy, he’s quite the inquisitive type, isn’t he? Is that why Clarence hangs around him—because Crowley asks as many questions as the average cop?

            “Because, _bozo_ ,” I finally replied with a slightly annoyed tone, “Don’t you know how expensive it is to switch your name to another car? I might as well just turn myself into the police than attempt to do that. Too much money.” I tapped my fingers against my thigh impatiently and continued speaking before Crowley could say anything else. “So are we going or not? I’ll text you my address and you and hangover-boy over there can come get me. Oh, and don’t worry—me knowing who Cas is won’t change a single thing. I still have one goal and that’s to give Bela what she deserves.”

**xxx**

            We were in our motel room and attempting to find more information on anything we could: the _Thief of Hell_ , Bela, the burglary of the museum… but nothin’ was coming of it. Sammy was sitting at his laptop, staring at the screen blankly as he tried thinking of something else he could look up, but I could tell that there was nothing coming to mind. We ended up pulling an all-nighter the day before in an attempt to investigate more, but we’d been hitting dead ends nonstop that we were starting to get a bit discouraged. It was a few more moments of silence too much for me, so I decided to speak up.

            “We’ve sorta hit a dead end again, Sammy,” I observed out loud. Wasn’t really something that could help us advance in our files, but I couldn’t think of somethin’ else to say.

            “I know,” he replied with a sigh and ran a hand through his hair. “Do you think we should call Castiel and see what’s going on with him? Maybe he was able to do some of his spy stuff while we’ve been sitting here like idiots.”

            “Possibly, but we did tell him to let us know of anything as soon as he found something. We could still try, I s’pose.” I stood up from my bed and walked over to pick up my cell from the table close to the door. Scrolling through my contacts, I found Cas’ name and started dialing. It rang for a bit longer than I would have liked; I was expecting to reach a voicemail, but he probably picked it up at the last ring.

            “Hello?” His voice was rougher than usual, I noted, and he sounded a bit disoriented. Almost as if he were…

            “You gettin’ over your hangover, Cas?” I asked almost seriously, but a chuckle escaped my lips faster than I could contain it. We all have been in that boat—and the night before _did_ end in the man getting a _bit_ too much. I figured that by now he would be all right, though.

            “Um… Yeah,” he responded, and now I could tell that he was more so trying to speak softly than getting over the feelings of a hangover.

            “I was calling to see how your time with Mr. Crowley was going—you with him right now?” I asked, an eyebrow cocking up as I then heard shuffling and distant talking in the background.

            “This couldn’t have been the worst of timing. Can’t you text me or something?” Castiel sounded annoyed. _Annoyed_. That was a bit of a shocker, and it sorta made me bite the inside of my cheek, trying to keep the annoyance from getting to me as well.

            “I’ll take that as a _yes_ to my question,” I retorted dryly, eyes trailing over to Sam, who was resting his elbows on his knees and looking at me questioningly. I put up a finger for him to wait and then moved my eyes to focus on the bed in front of me. “Keep us updated if you find out anything. Even if it’s the slightest suspicious, okay?” When he didn’t reply, I cleared my throat slightly and repeated myself. “ _Okay_?”

            “All right. I’ll contact you if I find something even the slightest suspicious—” That was when I heard a voice in the background calling to him— _Cassie?_ I think I heard—before Castiel finished speaking quickly. “I gotta go now. Text me next time. Bye.”

            And then that fucker hung up.

            “So?” Sam asked inquisitively. I could sense the anticipation emanating from him. He could probably sense that there was no news for now, but my lil’ brother is always hopeful.

            “No dice,” I muttered and threw my cell at the bed in front of me before I flopped on it myself, facing my brother with arms crossed over my chest. “Not yet, anyway. He _is_ with Crowley _right now_ , though. He’s going to let us know if there’s anything weird happening.”

            Sam nodded and crossed his arms as well, looking to the ground thoughtfully before nodding again and clearing his throat. “Well, looks like we have time to spend while we wait. A break or something.”

            “Want to get some grub?” I asked with a smile when I saw Sam laugh slightly as my thoughts went straight to food.

            “Yeah, okay. Let’s go.”

 

**xxx**

 

            “Cassie?”

            “I gotta go now. Text me next time. Bye,” I muttered lowly and hung up the phone as quickly as possible. I turned around to smile over at Crowley, who was waiting by the door. We were going to pick up Meg so we could check out that lair she had forgotten about. “Sorry, it was a call from work.”

            Crowley frowned from slight worry and asked if everything was all right. I said yes—they wanted to see if there was anything new from the case. He nodded slowly, though the crease in his forehead was still visible when he turned around to walk out. He held the door open for me and I walked through but a hand was then rested on my shoulder to stop me from moving.

            “Cassie, I just realized how you stink of alcohol. Let’s go get you something clean-scented, yes?” He smiled at me and steered me back inside before I could protest. While he walked into his room, I called out to him and said Meg was be waiting and would most likely be annoyed if we took too long, but he took no notice to my words. Sticking his head out from the doorway, Crowley smiled with his mouth closed and chucked the clothes he picked out at my face. I almost caught them, but they mostly hit me hard in the nose, causing a grunt to escape from my lips and for him to laugh.

            I sighed slightly, though I couldn’t help but smile myself. “You sure these are going to fit?” I asked, looking over the clothing he tossed me.

            “Yes, I am sure. Now go ahead and put them on. Here,” he paused and walked out of the room to lean against the couch, “Go ahead and change in my room. I will wait out here. Don’t take too long, darling!” He patted me on the shoulder as he walked passed me and over to the doorway where he would wait. Arms crossed over his chest and he raised his eyebrows when he noticed I followed him with my eyes and didn’t head into the bedroom. “Go on, then. We don’t want Meg getting annoyed at us, now do we?”

            I nodded quickly and headed off into the room, closing the door behind me. That was when I noticed that the room smelled nice—wasn’t sure what the scent was, exactly, but it reminded me of blackberries but also scotch. I shrugged my shoulders slightly and then took a quick look around the room before I would change into the black clothes that were thrown at my face earlier. The room definitely reflected Crowley’s personality—neat and proper with sheets tucked at every edge and smoothed out perfectly along with multiple, fluffy pillows atop with some rose petals across the sheets. A bit over-the-top, I mused, though it _was_ Crowley’s bedroom that I was looking at. Nothing was out of place: books were all organized along the bookshelf and no clothes were seen on the floor. The carpet and walls were a nice deep, blood red while the bed was mostly made up of black along with some red pillows and most possibly a red undersheet. When I realized that I was overanalyzing the bedroom of a _thief_ who I now call my _friend_ , I snapped myself out of it and shrugged off my alcohol-smelling clothes to put on the freshly-scented ones that Crowley gave me. It was just a black undershirt with a simple, black overcoat, black pants and a red tie. He was certainly trying his hardest to get me into his fashion style, even if just unconsciously.

            Once finished, I walked out with my dirty clothes at hand and could see the smug smile of triumph on Crowley’s face. “This feels a bit odd. Not really what’s in my wardrobe,” I muttered as he opened the door for me again.

            “Yes, but it suits you very well, love,” he replied, the smile still splayed across his face. “All right, Cassie, let’s head on over to Meg before she blows up the world from impatience.”


	13. The Secret Lair

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right! So this is the most recent chapter I did (just finished it today actually!) I am going to try my hardest to stay as active as possible and not let months get in between each chapter. I REALLY wanna keep writing this. Here you go and enjoy!
> 
> Remember: "xxx" = POV shift ; "***" = time skip

            It took Laurel and Hardy _forever_ to show up at my place. I mean, _really_ , how long does it take for two guys to head straight over to a girl’s apartment? Apparently a long-ass time—it had been around a half-hour before they showed up at my door. Cas looked odd, to say the least, with the black suit and red tie, so I of course had to make a remark about it.

            “Hey, whoa, no one told me we were supposed to match today!” I grinned at them as I walked out of my door, making sure they didn’t see the mess that was my apartment. What? I haven’t been able to be organized ever since I found out I could ice Bela! A girl has her needs!

            “Nice to see you, too, _Megan_.” Crowley’s answer was so predictable that it hurt, and Cas looked at me as if—well, I’m not entirely sure. He just looked exhausted and fed up with the entire world. I mean… I’ve had bad hangovers before, so I completely empathize.

            My hands shoved into my blue jeans pockets as I started walking ahead of them, not bothering to see if they followed. I saw Crowley’s car and already bolted for shotgun before Cas could say yay or nay, and when I turned to stick my tongue out at him, I noticed a small smile appear on his face despite the eye roll he gave me. I do have to say that I was a bit antsy about making it back to Lucifer’s former lair and searching for the secret passage because _who knows_ who the hell got over there ever since our last visit. For all I knew Lucifer could be back and waiting for me, which would be exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time. _Ugh_ , why must life be so complicated?!

            Once the two of them finally caught up and we were on the road, it was a bit quiet so I decided to blast the radio because I’m not about all that awkward silence; no. Eventually, though, Crowley turned it off in a miffed manner and gave me a long look before turning his focus back onto the road. I awaited him to speak, because I knew that look: it was one of suspicion and doubt.

            “So you’re _certain_ that there’s some sort of _secret lair_ , yes?”

            “Certain? No. I’m just saying there is a possibility that the rumors were true. I could lie and say that I’m one-hundred-percent on this if you really want me to.”

            “No, _darling_ , that is quite all right,” he answered with an eye roll.

            “C’mon, _Thief of Hell_ , loosen up! Clarence back there is normally the uptight one,” I noted and crossed my arms before yawning. Boy, they were _boring_ me today.

            “Sometimes we have to be serious in order to get things done in a timely manner,” Crowley retaliated, eyes still on the road. _Yeesh_ , seems like somebody has _something_ on their mind today.

 

**xxx**

 

            Yes, I had a lot on my mind at that point. Cas was acting weird every time he got off the phone, and even though he said it was from the station, it just made me feel… _odd_. The two men he was talking to all the time made sense because of their jobs, but it was still slightly worrisome for some reason. Now, darlings, I wasn’t afraid that Cassie-dear would rat me out—don’t get me wrong. I just had a lot on my mind, is all. While we drove I wanted to stay focused on the task at hand and didn’t want to deviate from it, so Meg was being a bit more irking to me than usual. Wasn’t her fault, really; I just had a one-track mind at that point. Anyway, let me divert our attention to the _important_ parts of this story, since a tangent is probably not what you want.

            We finally made it to abandoned building and headed inside with flashlights since the sun’s rays weren’t enough to reveal any secrets untold, and I honestly felt like we were going nowhere right about then. That is until Meg came across a wall that had some sort of graffiti written across it. It looked like mostly gibberish to me, but she swore to us that it was a symbol of their “group.” That was when we all got to feeling along the edges and crevices of the old and unstable wall for anything that would lead us to a secret entrance. Unfortunately after a few minutes we hadn’t come across anything. I let out a sigh of frustration and I could see it on Meg’s face as well. It was a look that was _always_ etched across Cas’ features so I wasn’t sure what was going on with him.

            “This seems utterly pointless,” I finally said what was on my mind this entire time. I saw Meg cross her arms and let her weight shift to one leg as she looked at me incredulously.

            “Are you kidding me? This is a SECRET lair. That means it’s not easy to find, Crowley! Yes, let’s just _give up_ the first opportune moment, huh? You seriously that unmotivated?” She let out a frustrated sound and then went back to checking out the wall and fiddling with some of the furniture that was overturned on the dirty and uneven floor. I was about to take a seat on one of the chairs nearby when I heard Cas grunt. Meg and I looked at each other and then at Cas, who was attempting to move a long couch that was still upright.

            “A little help, please? This seems pretty stuck—“

            Meg then rushed over to the furniture and crouched down to look underneath, a loud laugh then starting to echo throughout the room as she hopped back onto her feet and hit Castiel hard on the shoulder with a grin. The look on his face was priceless, if I do say so myself!

            “Ow!!! I said _help_ me, not _hit_ me!” he yelled, confused with Meg’s actions as I was. I raised an eyebrow and watched her as she jumped around like a small child on Christmas Day. Did we just hit jackpot somehow?

            “Jackpot!” Well, all right, then. She pointed down at the bottom of the couch and looked at me with wide, twinkling eyes. “The couch is latched to the floor! This has to mean something. Do we have any tools? What am I saying—you’re a fucking _thief!_ Of course you do!” Okay, so this seemed pretty promising. And I of course, as Meg put it, have “tools.” I proudly showed them my pride and joy that was hidden under the trunk of my car’s floor and I could feel the disapproval coming from Castiel.

            “Oh, _come on_ , I thought you knew I was a bloody thief, for Pete’s sake!” I laughed and patted Cas on the back before pulling out what I needed to un-latch the couch from the floor. I did notice the small smile that appeared on his face, anyway, so I knew that he wasn’t judging _too_ hard.

 

**xxx**

 

            I didn’t approve of the tools for many reasons and one of them being that a plethora of them are _illegal_. It _was_ Crowley, though, so I’m not entirely sure what I expected. In all honesty, all this thievery was becoming a norm for me and I didn’t mind it all that much anymore (Please don’t ever tell my superiors that I uttered this—I will deny it to my grave!) When we made it back to the couch, Meg and Crowley were going straight to work on the latch. It seemed as though he really did have all the tricks in the book because the deed was done after one fell swoop. He was triumphant and proud, showing me his work like a puppy that presented their owner with a ball. How on earth could I stay cross-armed and with a stern look on my face at that?! I decided I would show how impressed I was in the most toned-down way possible so his head wouldn’t get too full of his ego.

            “All right, good job—” And just then I felt my phone buzz with a text. _Oh, great. What now?_ I knew I would have to look at it discreetly at some point just in case it was Dean being blunt with his wording on the whole “spying” thing. “—Looks like you’re actually useful for the greater good, Crowley,” I decided to joke to hide the true meaning behind my pause. The man scoffed at my answer and waved me off with his hand before he walked over to one edge of the furniture and picked it up to the best of his ability.

            “A little help would be nice,” he spoke with some strain on his voice due to the weight of the couch. Meg and I jumped right in to move it, and after a few struggling moments we were able to get it out of the way. Lo and behold, there was a hatch right where the couch was mere seconds before!

            “Well, I’ll be damned…” Meg whispered with a hand over her mouth. “It’s real! It really is! Okay, okay, we don’t know what could be in there, so we gotta be _extra_ cautious. All right?! Pretty boy, you’re a cop so you know how to be careful, and Fancy-Pants over here is used to this as well. But! What I want you guys to do is take that and amplify it by one thousand! There could be _who knows_ _what_ kind of traps down there.” I felt like she may have been exaggerating a little bit, but I didn’t want to doubt her and cause our demise, so I obliged. Crowley seemed to understand and offered he go down first. “Fine by me,” Meg answered, relief evident in her voice. Crowley going in would make it easier for me to sneak a peek at my phone, so I concurred.

 **{ text: Dean }** _anything?_

                        **{ text: Me }** _no nothing unusual yet. I’ll keep you updated._

            “Hey there, Clarence, you mind putting that phone away and paying attention to the glory that is a secret passageway? Sheesh, as a cop I thought you’d be all over this!” Meg interrupted my thought process and I quickly put my phone away with a chuckle and a nod. “Mhmm~” she hummed in response with a wink before heading down the passageway following Crowley. It seemed a bit cramped and dusty in there, so I was hoping that Crowley wouldn’t mind that his clothes wouldn’t be in tip-top shape by the time we were done with this mission. I noted that it was a little strange that I was concerned more about his _clothes_ than anything else at this point, but I shrugged it off as if it were nothing.

 

**xxx**

 

            “You _seriously_ have to stop checking your phone ever few seconds, Dean. This is the first time I’ve seen you not enjoy your burger.” We decided to eat out at a diner and got the usual, but the surprise was that Dean wasn’t even touching his burger after a few bites. I knew he was focused on talking to Cas about the case, but the guy even said that there was nothing going on at the moment and that he would keep us updated. So why in the world was my brother still adamant about looking at his phone?

            “You know, it’s not going to make him reply faster.”

            “Yeah, Sammy, I know. I just can’t shake this feeling.”

            “What, that you’re sick or something?” I asked, already finishing my salad when normally Dean would have been done minutes ago. I pointed at his burger and he waved me off before picking it up and taking a bite out of it.

            “No, _dumbass_. I feel like Cas isn’t telling us everything,” he replied with his mouth full per usual.

            “Why in the world would he not tell us things? He’s a cop, Dean.”

            “Yeah, I know, but you’d think that something would have turned up by now. I mean, he _has_ been hanging out with Crowley a lot, right?” As much as I believed my statement, Dean did have somewhat of a point. I still couldn’t figure out the _why_ if Cas was actually lying to us. It just didn’t make any sense.

            “Okay, I feel that way as well but remember that the guy wasn’t found guilty of being a thief. Maybe he’s just a regular guy who likes hanging out with Cas as friends. Ever thought of _that_ as a possibility?”

            “You bring up great points, Sammy,” Dean bickered, “And yet I can’t stop staring at my phone. His answers are always so short when it’s over the phone or text. I know it could be because he’s around Crowley and doesn’t want there to be any sort of suspicions—“ that was the point I was about to make, actually. “—but, like I said, it’s _weird._ Okay? And quit talkin’ ‘bout my burger. I’ll eat it as I like!”

            I sighed and shrugged my shoulders, unable to come up with a response to Dean’s argument besides a scoff. Sure, this all _sort of_ made sense, but it doesn’t add up. There wouldn’t be a reason for Cas to hide important information from us, right? I mean, what on earth would he have to hide?


	14. Hit List

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to write a new chapter at least each month! I believe my last one was in February, so here is my March entry! Enjoy!
> 
> *note, there is a POV shift from the last chapter but there are no time skips nor POV shifts in this specific chapter.*

            Crowley and Meg somehow got through the hatch easily and I couldn’t figure it out one bit because I kept bumping into the sides and almost slipping away from the ladder that was wobblier than anything I’ve ever seen. At one point my—Crowley’s—tie got caught on some sort of metal poking out of the wall and it took me a moment to get it off, causing Meg and Crowley to holler at me as if I were doing this on purpose. I ignored them because I knew saying something wouldn’t help, and then finally I got the tie off the small pipe or whatever it was. It was so dark and my flashlight was currently in my pocket so I couldn’t entirely tell what was around me, either, which was equally as frustrating.

            _Finally_ I reached the bottom and I could see Meg and Crowley sneer at me, trying not to laugh. “What? What is it?” I asked, confused. They then looked at each other and back at me, with Meg finally starting to cackle and folding over. “ _What_?!” I asked again, getting a bit annoyed that they weren’t saying anything.

            Crowley, who was able to keep his composure, grinned and pointed at me before saying, “You’re bloody dirty as if you rolled around in the dirt, mate!” That was when he couldn’t keep his laughter in and he and Meg both laughed against each other. _Wow_ , are they serious? It couldn’t be _that_ bad!

            “All right, all right, it’s _hilarious_. I’m sure it’s not that bad and you’re just trying to make me get self-conscious. How about we focus on the goal here, huh? Also, _shouldn’t we be quiet?_ ”

            “Nah, we’re alone,” Meg answered after she stifled her giggles and seemed to calm down a bit, “We scoped the area briefly while you were, uh, _busy_ up there. Didn’t check your phone again while you were up there, did ya?” At her last comment, I felt my stomach jolt. My eyes darted towards Crowley and then back to her, hoping that he wouldn’t think much of what she just said. However…

            “Checking your phone while going down the hatch, huh? How important was it that it got you to collect dust?” Crowley spoke in a playful manner so I was hoping that he didn’t find anything suspicious about it. If he did, he was hiding it well.

            “People text me, you know. I may not hang around a lot of people but I still have friends,” I retorted, trying to be as sassy as possible to distract him from what I was actually doing. I didn’t _want_ to spy on Crowley, and I wasn’t planning on telling the Winchesters about him, but what we just came across… it’s a _big_ deal. A big kahuna mob boss that has a secret lair? This is something I would _have_ to call in immediately! This whole double-agent crap was starting to get to me; I didn’t realize just how complicated my life would be until that point.

            My tactic seemed to work because they both just laughed and turned back to looking around the room. It was pitch black, so our flashlights were essential for finding out anything; I started searching the walls for some sort of light switch which I finally found after a few terrifying moments of _what the heck did I just touch_. I flipped it, and then there was a dim light filling the room after a few flickers. Once my eyes adjusted, I was finally able to scope the area: dark, dirty walls (I made a mental note that I’d have to wash my hands thoroughly since I had searched the walls with them) and a plain, black desk with a turned over chair. The room was relatively small, and there didn’t seem to be anything quite _interesting_ about it. Maybe that meant I didn’t need to feel divided about whether I should or not call this in?

            “Hey, look at this.” Crowley’s voice made me look over to where he and Meg were standing. At first it looked like they were staring at the wall, but as I got closer I noticed there was some sort of billboard with pictures on it—pictures of people, to be specific. “Recognize any of these faces?” he asked Meg, but all she did was stare in silence. Crowley then snapped his fingers to catch her attention: “He-llo? Earth to _Megan_?”

            “It’s _Meg_ ,” she then responded rather quickly.

            “Ah, I see, so you’re just ignoring me. That’s perfect. That’s fine, guess we won’t find Bela aftera—“

            “Will you just shut the hell up?! I was thinking!!! You wanna know who these people are? They are people who left the group. They’re people that were then ordered to be killed. You know, how I was supposed to be hadn’t Lucifer butt in,” she explained in an almost exasperated manner. She seemed extremely bothered by all this, which was completely understandable given her situation.

            “Your picture is not here, though,” I observed as I peeked past her head—I hadn’t noticed how short she was until then. “That’s a good thing, right?” She brought a hand up to her chin, seemingly lost in thought but then shrugged.

            “I don’t really know. Maybe. We should check out the desk.” She then squeezed past Crowley and me over to the dusty piece of furniture that didn’t have anything atop it. She started shuffling through papers within the drawers in search of something—whether for something specific or not, I had no idea. That was when Crowley came up to me asking if we could talk in private for a moment to which Meg quipped that it would be difficult to do so due to the room being slightly larger than the size of a cubicle. He, of course, rolled his eyes and didn’t respond to her. Crowley gestured to the farthest corner away from Meg, leading me with his arm around the back of my shoulders. Had this been way back when we first met, I would have felt uncomfortable, but right at that moment it almost felt comforting in a way. I was confused by this thought that went through my mind and I quickly dismissed it for he then started talking to me quietly about something a _bit_ more important than that.

            “Hey, are you doing okay?” he inquired in an almost worried manner, “You’ve been… _off_ lately. Did you hear anything from the skyscraper and bowlegs?” Sam and Dean I assumed is what he meant, and that made my insides twist and turn. I tried not to show it in my face but took advantage of previous circumstances of mine as an excuse, hoping it would be good enough for him.

            “It’s just the after effects of being hung over, I’m sure,” I answered in a slightly graveled tone—on purpose, yes, but I needed to act the part to make it believable, or at least _halfway_ believable, because he didn’t entirely seem to buy it. I could tell since his eyes squinted slightly and his eyebrows rose as he kept his eyes on me. I shifted my weight uncomfortably in the silence that was settling between us, unsure of what else I should do. “Sam and Dean have been telling me that nothing’s been going on. They’ve got no leads or anything. That’s good news, right? Don’t worry about it; we’re fine.” What I told him was completely true. Yes, I omitted the fact that they wanted me to keep an eye on Crowley, but I also wasn’t telling them anything about what was going on, so there was no need to inform him about that detail, right? It seemed logical enough to me. Besides, my last sentence changed his demeanor entirely from stiff and concerned to relaxed and calm. He then smiled at me.

            “Oh, good. That is most certainly good news. Just let me know if any of that changes, all right, m’dear?” He then patted me on the shoulder, gripping it tightly in the sort of way good friends do when they are trying to be emotionally helpful in one way or another. I didn’t entirely understand, but all I knew was that his hand on my shoulder was warm through the shirt of his that I was wearing and it made me feel better almost immediately. It was strange, certainly, but before I could think about any internal conflicts Meg yelled out to the both of us.

            “ _Eureka!_ ” she hollered with excitement, pulling out a file of some sort and skimming through it. I looked at Crowley who nodded at me and we both headed back over to our other _partner-in-crime._ Once we were close enough, she waved the file around in front of our faces, flapping it against Crowley’s nose purposefully—to which he shouted indignantly, “Stop that at once!!!”—before opening it up and explaining what it was that she was so ecstatic about.

            “All right, boys: listen up! Here we’ve got a blueprint. Not just _any_ blueprint. It’s _Lucifer’s new abode_. It has to be! Why else would this be here? It has been scribbled all over but from what I gather, it looks like they’ve taken a modern approach. Ole Loosey Goosey seems to have joined the club crowd,” she explained quickly.

            “ _Go on_ …?” Crowley was watching her curiously, crossing his arms as he awaited her to continue speaking. She smirked and smacked the file closed in a rather dramatic manner, dropping it down on the desk with a loud _thwump_.

            “That, my dear friend, means that he’s moved completely underground—underneath a dance club, to be exact. What better place to be other than somewhere there are always people? It’s _genius!!!_ ” Meg seemed a bit _too_ into this whole thing, but then again this meant that we were getting one step closer to Bela, which was a _great_ thing.

“I should call this in—” I started, but then Crowley placed his hand atop my head, which startled me and caused me to trail off my sentence. I looked over at him and he scrunched up his face in a sort of uncertain way. Did he not think it was a good idea to do?

            “How about we take matters into our own hands, Cassie? No need to get your folks involved, yes?”

            “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. I’ve already withheld a lot of information from them. I can’t afford to keep risking my job like this; I have to call it in,” I argued firmly, removing his hand from my head with a frown. He seemed a tad bit surprised with my sudden sternness—that reaction made me feel a bit satisfied, I’m not going to lie. “I’ll wait until we’re gone and out of here, but I’ll have to call it in. I’m going to. It won’t interrupt our plans, I promise. Remember, if we have the police force on our side, we’ll find her faster. Fair enough?” Surprisingly enough for me, Crowley contemplated my words and nodded in agreement. Well, that was weird.

            Meg was obviously getting impatient with all the chatter and stalling because she was now set on a mission, the path was just cleared, and the destination was now in her sights. “Are you boys ready to get into the club scene?” she asked with a wriggle of her eyebrows and a wide grin.


End file.
